Old Cucumber Soup

I cooked 老黄瓜汤 Old Cucumber Soup today. Although I have to work, I still manage to buy some ingredients to cook. Soup would be the most ideal for me as it doesn't require much attention to cook. Didn't really planned to cook actually but then I just couldn't stand eating outside food.



The ingredients are as above photo.
1. 1 Old Cucumber
2. 1 Carrot
3. A small plate of salted veggie
4. A small bowl of red dates. (Actually a estimated a handful of it)
5. Pork ribs/bones (U can also use chicken carcass actually... but I prefer pork ribs or bones coz it gives the soup better flavor)

I missed out tofu and dried stingray. T_T
It was a rush job gathering the ingredients. Was double parking also... hahaha... luckily no saman.

Preparing it is also easy like the Lotus Root Peanut Soup I posted few days ago.

First you should wash the salted veggie. Wash out all the salt and sand and soak it for about 15 - 20 minutes. It should be about time after you prepare all the items below.

Then u scrap out some skin from the old cucumber. You dun need to skin it. Cut it into quarters, remove the seeds at the center of the cucumber and cut them to about 1 inch wide evenly.

For the carrot, skin it and cut it into small pieces however u want to consume it.

You can cut the dates into half or slice it open so that the sweetness of the red dates will blend into the soup.

The pork ribs/bones just rinse it with water. My advice is as usual, get the butcher to cut it into small pieces for you. Dun get urself injured and damage ur chopper. Actually my mom would boil a pot of water and scald the pork for few seconds and take it out. She told me that would get rid of some smell present in the meat and it would also make the soup clearer. But I dun do that coz I think the nutrients would have been washed away.

The forgotten ingredient: tofu... just cut it into 4 quarters and throw it into the pot. Dried stingray u just need to rinse it and throw into the pot.



U can look above photo as reference.



After 2 hours plus of slow fire, THE SOUP IS READY~!!!!

Note: U do NOT need to add salt to the soup. It should be salty enough due to the salted veggie. Control the amount of salted veggie to put in. Ideal amount would be salty enough for you to consume the soup without further adding salt. However if you put too little and find ur soup is not salty enough, feel free to add in more salt.

This time I was able to take pictures of the soup b4 it was finished~! YAY~!!

I think the next soup I will make is either radish soup or Sai Yong Choi Tong.