Corn and Carrot Soup (with Chinese Yam aka Huai Shan 淮山)

A healthy soup that won't go wrong! My children love to drink soup and they love corn. Hence, it's easy to prepare different types of soups with corn in it! Corns have natural sweetness to make the soup fragrant. And honestly, it's very easy to make this soup.

Corn and Carrot Soup

Ingredients

2-3 corns

1 carrot

Some pork slices

15cm Chinese Yam (淮山)

Throw all the ingredients into the pressure cooker

Steps

1. Chop the corn, carrot and Chinese yam into 2cm width.

2. Add 3 bowls of water into the pot with the pork slices and the ingredients.

3. Boil for 30 minutes.

4. Serve.

Notes

1. I use organic corn as I feel they are much healthier.

2. For carrots, I usually don't remove the skin as it contains lots of vitamins. Rinse well the carrots and eat with the skin.

3. Chinese Yam is great for digestive system and it's really sweet as it blends well with the meat and corn.

Radish and carrot soup

I chanced by my Bishan market and saw white radish! I am so amazed that they sold organic white radish that are grown in our home soil - Singapore! Wow! They looked so beautiful and I have decided to try cooking them.

Occasions

Lunch

Dinner

Ingredients
4 small white radish or 1 large radish
2 medium carrots
$2 worth of pork ribs
4 red dates
1 small piece of ginger


Steps
1. Blanch the pork ribs for a minute.
2. Remove the skin of radish and carrots. Chop them into 1cm thick and place into the soup of 1.5 litres of water. Add the
ribs.
3. Cut the red dates into half and add into the water, together with one small piece of ginger.
4. Boil for 45 minutes and serve.
5. Add salt to taste.

You may ask how come I want to add a piece of ginger into the soup. Will it spoil the sweetness of the roots? Apparently, radish are 'cold' 寒 in nature. In order to remove this coldness 去风, it is recommended to add ginger. Red dates also have this power to do so also!

Actually pork ribs are optional for this soup. You can omit it and make this as a pure vegetable soup as well. Radish, however have this special capability to absorb sweetness in meat, and when you bite it, you can taste the enhanced sweetness with its original taste. I urge you to try once with and without pork ribs. There is a difference in the sweetness.

I have tried organic radish as well as normal ones. And I'm really amazed to know that organic ones are so much sweeter and it's delicious. You can go to Blk 151 Bishan Street 13 vegetable stall to get these. Apparently the farmer grows at Lim Chu Kang. I really hope to go and visit his amazing farm one day. Organic radish are slightly smaller and thinner. Hence you need to get around 4-5 of them depending on the amount you need to cook.

A gentle note is try not to drink this soup too often. Probably once every fortnight is good enough. Love this soup so much!