SteemitMamas Writealong 5th Challenge/Day 9: Share A Recipe!

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In response to the SteemitMamas Writealong Challenge for Day 9, I am going to share a super simple recipe of a Chinese chicken soup. It is my comfort food and reminds me ALWAYS of home because my mom cooks it a lot back home. We usually eat it with the Chinese longevity noodle aka mee sua, and it can be a birthday dish practised in some homes. I just cannot get enough of this bowl of goodness. Since it was a rainy Saturday and for some reason, I very tend to boil chicken or tonic soup on Saturday, I found myself the valid reason to do this!

It is a super SIMPLE recipe because it is all about boiling the ingredients together! It is as easy as prepping the ingredients, and add them all into a big pot! Yeap, that's about it!

Ingredients

• 2 cloves of chopped garlic
• half a chicken
• 8 red dates
• Goji berries
• Cordyceps flowers
• 5-6 dried Shiitake mushrooms
• longevity noodles /mee sua

Red dates, cordyceps flowers and gojiberries

How to cook it

1. Defrost the chicken and soak the dried Shiitake mushrooms in hot water. After the mushrooms are softened, cut the mushrooms into quarters.
2. Bowl a pot of water and when the water started boiling, add in the garlic, goji berries, red dates and some cordyceps flowers.
3. Add in the cut mushrooms and chicken.
4. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
5. Let the soup come to a boil and then simmer it for 45 minutes to 1 hour to get the full taste of the soup. I like to add some homemade Chinese red wine to it, but I now add it separately because my son drinks the soup too.
6. When the soup is about to be done, boil a separate pot of water to just blanch the longetivity noodles. It is cooked easily after it has gone through boiling water.

_{All the goodness boiled in one pot.}

The soup will looks bit yellowish because of the cordyceps flowers. It also means all the essence of it has mixed with the soup. The soup smells very fragrant because of the herbs. Of course you can add in other Chinese herbs as well like ginseng, Chinese yam etc.

My all-time comfort food

Health Benefits

I cook this soup rather often because I know it is delicious and also nourishing. I too have recommended it to many of my friends, especially those with young children. Recently, the HFMD is very serious in my country so I am trying my best to boost my son's immune system. We drink something similar to this once a week and steam up a protein (either pork or chicken) with the cordyceps flowers as well with some gojiberries. It is very delicious, so I totally don't mind eating it more. When we steam it up, the essence from the chicken adds extra flavour to it too.

There are a whole lot of benefits from the Cordyceps flowers which is also known as Cordyceps Sinesis. Here is what I found from this website:

According to Traditional Chinese Medicine, cordyceps flower have the following health benefits:

Nourish lungs
Reduce fatigue
Enhance our immune system
Improve sleep
Tonify kidneys and liver
Cough relief (it helps to moisten the throat)
Anti-aging

Here at where I am, Cordyceps flowers can be found at any Chinese Medicine shop selling the Chinese herbs. Maybe you will be able to find some at the Chinatown in your place.

My friend's birthday was last week, so when I was cooking this, I thought of her and made some for her too. For the birthday person, we usually add some boiled eggs too, as egg signifies birth, I guess. She likes the red wine which was fermented from home by the Foo Chows (a dialect of Chinese), so I added it generously for her.

Let me know if any of you try this out!!! Bon Appetite! Thank you for reading my simple recipe. I am not sure if people from other parts of the world would love this type of chicken soup or not, though. If you are adventurous in food tasting, try it!

Do check out the @steemitmamas' latest challenge here Write Along Day 9: Share a Recipe! and join the write-along! It can be about a food recipe or any recipe to do something!

Join us @steemitbloggers
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Posted from my blog with SteemPress : http://happycrazycon.vornix.blog/2018/08/21/steemitmamas-writealong-5th-challenge-day-9-share-a-recipe/

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