So after a busy week of fine dining it was time to get back in the kitchen and come up with some healthier recipe ideas. After practicing some meals which didn’t really work out (for a few reasons but mainly because of too many elements on the plate), I thought I’d make Dean and I a lovely simple lunch.
I had made a similar recipe when we lived in the old house. It’s amazing what you can make with leftovers if you put your mind to it. We had duck from the dinner the night before and I decided to make it the star of the show in this delicious soup.
There’s a real aroma that comes from this soup when cooking it from the ginger, soy and garlic. It has so much flavour packed in along with a small but exciting kick of heat, which was great as it’s been so cold here lately and it really did warm us up!
This soup was meatier than I expected it to be (as my mum would say you don’t get much meat on a duck 😂), but I was surprised just how much meat was left. When I was a child we used to have duck on a Sunday with a roast or sometimes we would have duck and chips (my goodness I’ve not had that for about 10 years)! Dean finds this rather funny as he used to only really have duck with Chinese food.
There’s so much to love about this soup, from how easy it is to make to all the different flavours coming through – it’s just a little more interesting than your everyday soup. I know duck isn’t the healthiest of meats but the sweetcorn and egg provide you with some great nutrition.
I had a really interesting conversation with my friend Amie the other day about eggs, she HATES a runny egg! I thought at first she meant when they are in soups. But I soon realised she meant ANY runny egg! I was so shocked, I thought everyone loved a dippy egg now and again! Her actual words were ‘they’re gross!” – in fact I’ve even been reconsidering our friendship as a result (only joking Amie 😂)!
If ever Dean and I have been out for breakfast and we get a hard poached egg instead of a runny one I end up sulking – it’s just not the same! I actually think there’s something a little bit sexy about a runny egg! 😮 😂 Ahem, moving on…
Chinese year has just been and gone and Dean and I were very lucky to celebrate it with our friends Annie and Rory this year. Annie invited us to Cardiff to go to a restaurant called Hogwurst, where I was lucky enough to go last summer.
Hogwurst is run by a man called Hoa, who is Chinese and had a pop up evening doing Chinese buns to celebrate new year. We were all excited by this and had a really amazing foodie day with Annie and Rory.
They served varying types of steamed buns. Dean and I both had slow braised beef in a black bean, ginger and soy sauce with roquito chillies, roasted red peppers, mild horseradish drizzle, lotus root crisp, coriander.
Then we shared the slow cooked sweet sticky pork, toasted nuts, sesame seeds, crackling, dressed carrot and cucumber. Finally, I had the tempura prawns, sweet chilli drizzle, lemon and truffle caviar mayo, seaweed wrap, lotus crisp, dressed cucumber.
They were all absolutely delicious and looked amazing! We both enjoyed every mouthful. We were lucky enough to try the jellyfish salad, yes jellyfish!! 😂 The texture was kind of like smoked salmon but it wasn’t as strong in flavour – we both really enjoyed it!
On a related note we are getting some practice in with our chopsticks as we are hoping to visit Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore in April 😬 😊 We are both extremely excited about that, Dean has always said that Japan especially is at the top of his bucket list! Have you visited any of these places? I’d love to hear your recommendations 😀
Chinese Style Duck and Sweetcorn Soup
Ingredients
- 1 tsp rapeseed oil
- 1 tsp garlic paste
- 1 tsp ginger paste
- 3 spring onions Thinly slice two of them. The third one is for a garnish.
- 1 medium fresh red chilli Thinly sliced, use half for garnishing.
- 900 ml chicken stock Good quality
- 1 1/2 tbsp cornflour Mixed with water from the tap – approx 2 tbsp
- 2 tsp soy sauce
- 1/2 tsp ground coriander
- 2 duck legs Meat taken off the bone
- 140 g tinned sweetcorn I used no added salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 handful fresh coriander Garnish
- white pepper Seasoning
Instructions
- I used leftover duck from the night before and shredded the meat off. If you wish to cook the duck on the day just follow the instructions according to the packet.
- Heat the oil in a saucepan on a medium heat, add the garlic and ginger paste and stir it all in for about a minute. Add the spring onion and chilli and cook until the spring onion has wilted.
- Add your chicken stock to your pan along with the diluted cornflower. Whisk it in with a balloon whisk and turn the heat up until it comes to the boil.
- Turn down the heat then add the soy sauce and ground coriander, give it a good stir.
- Add the shredded duck and leave on a simmer for about 25 minutes, the juices from the duck will help flavour your soup.
- Add the tinned sweetcorn to the soup then bring it back up to the simmer. Taste your soup seeing if it needs any more soy sauce.
- Whisk both eggs in a jug with a fork, take your soup off the heat and then pour in the eggs, slowly stirring as your go. Your soup will become lighter and the egg will become string like. Season with white pepper.
- Ladle the soup into bowls and garnish with red chilli, spring onion and fresh coriander. Enjoy!
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