Hot & Sour Soup

Why this recipe works: Authentic versions of this soup have some hard-to-find ingredients such as mustard pickle, pig’s-foot tendon, and dried sea cucumber—ingredients we couldn’t find in the local grocery store. Using inventory only from our local supermarket, we wanted an authentic take on hot and sour soup, including spicy, bracing, pungent elements.

We created the “hot” side of the soup with two heat sources—distinctive, penetrating white pepper and a little chili oil. For the “sour” component, we preferred the traditional Chinese black vinegar, but found that a tablespoon each of balsamic and red wine vinegar made a suitable substitution. Cornstarch turned out to be a key ingredient: A cornstarch-based slurry thickened the soup; adding cornstarch to the pork marinade gave the pork a protective sheath that kept it tender; and beating the egg with cornstarch before drizzling it into the thickened soup kept the egg light, wispy, and cohesive. Pork and tofu are the usual, easy-to-find additions to the broth, but we had to come up with substitutes for a few other classic ingredients, settling on fresh shiitakes in lieu of wood ear mushrooms and canned bamboo shoots instead of lily buds. Spicy, bracing, rich, and complex, this soup has all the flavor of the classic version

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Preheat: °Yield: 8 servings
Prep: 0:00Wait: 0:00Cook: 0:00

Ingredients

  • 7 ounces extra-firm tofu , drained
  • 4 tablespoons soy sauce
  • 1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
  • 3 tablespoons cornstarch , plus an additional 1 1/2 teaspoons
  • 1 boneless, center-cut, pork loin chop (1/2 inch thick, about 6 ounces), trimmed of fat and cut into 1 inch by 1/8-inch matchsticks
  • 3 tablespoons cold water , plus 1 additional teaspoon
  • 1 large egg
  • 6 cups low-sodium chicken broth
  • 1 cup bamboo shoots (from one 5-ounce can), sliced lengthwise into 1/8-inch-thick strips
  • 4 ounces fresh shiitake mushrooms , stems removed, caps sliced 1/4 inch thick (about 1 cup)
  • 5 tablespoons black Chinese vinegar or 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar plus 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar (see note above)
  • 2 teaspoons chili oil (see note above)
  • 1 teaspoon ground white pepper
  • 3 medium scallions , sliced thin

Directions

  1. Place tofu in pie plate and set heavy plate on top. Weight with 2 heavy cans; let stand at least 15 minutes (tofu should release about 1/2 cup liquid). Whisk 1 tablespoon soy sauce, sesame oil, and 1 teaspoon cornstarch in medium bowl; toss pork with marinade and set aside for at least 10 minutes (but no more than 30 minutes).
  2. Combine 3 tablespoons cornstarch with 3 tablespoons water in small bowl and mix thoroughly; set aside, leaving spoon in bowl. Mix remaining 1/2 teaspoon cornstarch with remaining 1 teaspoon water in small bowl; add egg and beat with fork until combined. Set aside.
  3. Bring broth to boil in large saucepan set over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to medium-low; add bamboo shoots and mushrooms and simmer until mushrooms are just tender, about 5 minutes. While broth simmers, dice tofu into 1/2-inch cubes. Add tofu and pork, including marinade, to soup, stirring to separate any pieces of pork that stick together. Continue to simmer until pork is no longer pink, about 2 minutes.
  4. Stir cornstarch mixture to recombine. Add to soup and increase heat to medium-high; cook, stirring occasionally, until soup thickens and turns translucent, about 1 minute. Stir in vinegar, chili oil, pepper, and remaining 3 tablespoons soy sauce; turn off heat.
  5. Without stirring soup, use soupspoon to slowly drizzle very thin streams of egg mixture into pot in circular motion. Let soup sit 1 minute, then return saucepan to medium-high heat. Bring soup to gentle boil, then immediately remove from heat. Gently stir soup once to evenly distribute egg; ladle into bowls and top with scallions.

Notes

  1. To make slicing the pork chop easier, freeze it for 15 minutes.
  2. We prefer the distinctive flavor of Chinese black vinegar; look for it in Asian supermarkets. If you can't find it, a combination of red wine vinegar and balsamic vinegar approximates its flavor.
  3. This soup is very spicy. For a less spicy soup, omit the chili oil altogether or add only 1 teaspoon.
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recipes/hot_and_sour_soup.txt · Last modified: 2016/12/12 15:27 (external edit)
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