Traditional Chinese Soup To Help Soothe Seasonal Depression
As most of us do, during the time period from September to March the struggle of seasonal depression starts to kick in. I often teeter my thoughts thinking “How can I prepare myself in advance, when I start to linger these heavy feelings?”. Unfortunately I haven’t quite found the ground breaking solution to this yet. But I did start listing a bunch of things that comfort me when I feel sad in these cold winter months. One of the things I listed is Chinese soup or also known as “tung”. This is the soup that genuinely feels like a big warm hug. All my worries suddenly go away for the short span of fifteen minutes when I’m consuming this rich, sweet, and savoury heavenly broth.
Growing up as a child, and living in a standard Chinese household in the suburbs. I have fond memories of my family visiting my grandma every Sunday. After our big traditional meals my “ngin ngin” (grandma) cooked for us. There was always a huge pot of soup sitting there on her stove top, waiting for me to consume towards the end of our meal. I always got told by my grandma, that her Chinese tung has a lot of health healing properties. And as well soothes digestion from all the hardy vegetables, and silky rich bone broth. Even though I’m not sure if this claim is one-hundred percent true. I do have some faith in her wisdom since my ngin ngin is still going strong at wise age of 93 year’s old . My mom recently taught me how she makes her version of tung. And I wanted to share the skills I learned in the kitchen from her on how to make the most perfect Chinese soup to help you ease out of that seasonal slump.
Ingredient list
3+1/2 Litres of water
1 whole chicken carcass
handful of jujube red dates
3 candied dates
big handful of water cress
1 lotus root
1 jumbo carrots
fish cakes block
table salt
Instructions
Fill a large pot with 3.5 litres of water and bring to a boil on high heat. Once it has reached a boil reduce your heat to medium, and carefully add your chicken carcass and boil for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes has passed add a handful of jujube red dates, and 3 candied dates. Reduce the heat to medium low and simmer for 1 hour and 30 minutes.
While boiling rinse, and peel your lotus root, and jumbo carrot. Chop your carrots into 1/4 inch coin slices, the lotus root into thin 1/8 inch slices, and fish cake block into 1/4 inch slices, set aside. Rinse your water cress a few times in a colander to make sure you get all the dirt out of the vegetable, and set aside.
Once the chicken carcass has simmered for 1 hour and 30 minutes carefully remove the carcass into a bowl let it cool down for 15 minutes. After the carcass has cooled, use either chopsticks or your fingers to remove the remaining meat off the chicken and add it back into the pot. After you successfully remove all the meat, depose the skeleton of the carcass.
Begin to add your carrots and lotus root to the pot and cook for 20-25 minutes or until vegetables are tender on medium low heat. (If the soup base has reduced too much add more boiling water until it reaches just above the vegetables).
Once the root vegetables are tender, add your sliced up fish cakes and watercress, and cook for an additional 10-15 minutes. Sprinkle in a little bit of table salt at a time, and taste the soup broth as you go. Once the water cress has turned a darker green colour your soup is ready to serve.
TIP: If you leave the soup in the fridge over night it develops more flavour and the soup sweetens from the dates marinating. When re-heating the following day feel free to add more water and salt to adjust the taste.
Delicious