Yen Can Cook ~ Night Blooming Cereus Soup with Dried Fig & Pear
I believe many of you are scratching your head thinking what on earth is this ‘Night Blooming Cereus’! It sound really “alien” to me too when I googled about its English name.
Night Blooming Cereus, 霸王花 Ba Wang Hua in Mandarin or Ba Wong Fa in Cantonese, is the common name referring to a large number of flowering ceroid cacti that bloom at night. They are belong to cactus family and pitahaya or dragon fruit plant is one of the species that we familiar with under this cacti family.
The dried flowers of the night blooming cereus is used as ingredient for Chinese boiled soup. According to Traditional Chinese Medicine, night blooming cereus is cold in nature and taste sweet. It helps to expel heat, clear phlegm and nourish the lungs. Together with other ingredients such as dried fig which can cleanse the intestine and invigorate the spleen as well as pear which can moisten lungs, this soup is good for those often stay up late at night and those who smokes and drinks excessively.
Oh ya, the dried flowers will slightly thicken the soup, rendering a stock-like consistency broth.
Ingredients (Serve: 3 – 4)
300g chicken/pork ribs
35g dried Night Blooming Cereus
2 pears, core removed and cut into big pieces
8 dried figs
11g South apricot kernels 南杏
8g North apricot kernels 北杏
2500ml water
salt to taste
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Step 1: Soak the dried flowers and rinse for a few times. Drain and set aside.
Step 2: Put the pork ribs/pork soup bones/chicken into a pot of water and bring to boil, to remove blood and impurities. Remove, drain and set aside.
Step 3:Put all the ingredients (except salt) into a pot and add in water until enough to immerse all the ingredients. Bring to boil and lower the heat and let the soup simmer for 2-3 hours.
Step 4: Add salt to taste and serve.
HAPPY COOKING!
#dudukrumah #stayathomeagain #stayhealthy
Very exotic indeed because of the addition of pear. 🙂
Honestly I have yet to consume any soup with pear…
Tekkaus, actually pear is quite a common ingredients for Chinese style soup, for both savoury and sweet.
I’d pay money to have this!
KY, make it at home definitely better because you can control the flavour and quality of the food.
Hi, do you drink the soup with that boiled water with ginger & cooking wine? Or is that water thrown away?
The water with the ginger and cooking wine used to parboil the meat is discarded, and fresh water is added to make the broth you ultimately eat.
Thank you Jess 🙂
Chris, the water that used to boil the meat is discarded as it is rather dirty after boiling the meat.
I have the smaller type flowers, can those be used to cook soup also?
Delia, I can’t advice much on this because I’m not expert, I suggest you can ask for advice at Chinese medicine/herbal shop.