Chicken Wonton

In the Gilmore Park Church Community Kitchen, we helped Karen to make few hundreds of wonton for the community meal. Karen decided to serve Chinese dish during the Chinese New Year event. We were told that the community meal crowd applauded when it was announced during the previous meal.

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Karen made the wonton using chicken as some of the people at the community meal do not take pork. Karen used organic chicken broth to make the soup and added bak choy and mushroom to complete the soup.

Ingredients

This is the ingredients for 6 servings.

Ingredients for the wonton:

  • 1/2 lb ground chicken (you may substitute with pork or turkey)
  • 2 green onions, minced
  • 1 egg white
  • 1/2 cup water chestnuts (canned or fresh), minced
  • 1 tablespoon minced/grated ginger root
  • 1 tablespoon soy sauce
  • 1 teaspoon sesame oil
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons constarch
  • 1 12oz package wonton wrapper
  • egg white or water for sticking (if wrapper is too dry or has too much flour on it)

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Ingredients for the soup:

  • 1 litre chicken broth
  • 1 cup sliced mushrooms
  • 1 cup bak choy or napa cabbage, shredded
  • 1 cup snap peas or snow peas, trimmed & sliced (optional)

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Roasted Sweet Potato Soup

Minoo kicked start the Caring Place Community Kitchen with two dishes. The first dish is Roasted Sweet Potato soup with orange and ginger. You may make this dish with yam, pumpkin or other winter squashes.

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This Roasted Sweet Potato Soup is a creamy soup flavoured with orange zest and grated ginger. It is best served warm. The creaminess of the soup comes from the sour cream. However, you may substitute the sour cream with a couple tablespoons of peanut butter and it’s equally good.

Ingredients

  • 6 cups peeled, cubed yams or sweet potatoes (about 3 large ones)
  • 1 1/2 cups coarsely chopped onions
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 1 clove garlic, minced
  • 5 cups low-fat chicken broth
  • 1 tablespoon each grated orange zest and gingerroot
  • 1/2 teaspoon each ground cumin and salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
  • 6 tablespoons low-fat sour cream
  • Chopped, fresh cilantro for garnishing

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Pork Neck Bone and Japanese Pumpkin Soup

Julie is back from Taiwan and Vanessa immediately catch hold of her to demonstrate in the South Arm Community Kitchen. Julie demonstrated two Chinese dishes. The first one is Pork Neck Bone and Japanese Pumpkin Soup. In this time of the year, pumpkin and winter squashes are abundant in the farmer’s market.

Pumpkins are orange because they contain massive amounts of beta-carotene which turns into vitamin A in our body. Vitamin A is essential for good eye sight.

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Ingredients

  • 3 lbs pork neck bone
  • 10 cups of water
  • 1 small Japanese pumpkin (Kabocha), cut into chunk
  • 1 inch knob of ginger, slice
  • salt and white pepper to taste

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Click on the link below for the instructions.

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Seaweed Egg Swirl Soup

Julie also served a Seaweed Egg Swirl Soup together with the dumplings. This soup is very easy and quick to prepare.

Studies on seaweed has indicated that it has curative properties for tuberculosis, arthritis, colds and influenza, worm infestations and even tumors.

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Ingredients

  • Dried seaweed
  • Green onions, chopped
  • 2 eggs
  • Chicken Powder
  • Sesame oil

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Clam Chowder

Minoo started the cooking class in Caring Place for year 2007 with a popular soup, Clam Chowder. Minoo’s recipe is a simplified version which uses Cream of Mushroom Soup to gives the Clam Chowder its creaminess.

Minoo’s recipe is perfect at this time of the year. Vancouver had been unseasonably cold these days with quite a few days of snow storms and sub-zero temperatures. What is better than a hot bowl of soup in this cold winter?

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Ingredients

  • 3 tablespoons oil
  • 1 onion, finely chopped
  • 3 cloves garlic, minced
  • 4 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed
  • 1 can whole baby clams
  • 2 cans cream of mushroom soup, low sodium preferred
  • 2 teaspoons Mrs. Dash seasoning (optional)
  • 1 teaspoon dried parleys or you may use some fresh chopped parsleys
  • a pinch of dried thyme
  • a pinch of dried marjarom
  • salt and pepper to taste

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Click on the link below for the instructions.

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Minestrone Soup

For the second dish, Jean made a Minestrone Soup. Jean specifically made this dish for Tanni who had requested to learn how to make Italian dishes.

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Minestrone is an Italian soup made with fresh seasonal vegetables, often with the addition of pasta or rice and beans which make it into a complete meal by itself. Minestrone soup is also known as the poorer people’s cuisine in Italy. It is very filing and cheap to make and yet nutritious.

Ingredients

  • 1 large onion, chopped
  • 2 stalks celery, diced
  • 1 carrot, diced
  • 1 zucchini, diced
  • 1 fresh tomato, diced
  • 4 or 5 bunches of baby bok choy, chopped
  • 1 28oz can chopped tomatoes
  • 1 15.5oz can beans (Jean used white kidney beans)
  • 1/2 cup long grain rice
  • 2 cups tomato juice
  • 4 or 5 cups water
  • 4 teaspoons minced garlic
  • 1 tablespoon parsley flakes
  • 1 teaspoon dried basil
  • 1 teaspoon dried oregano
  • 1/2 teaspoon marjoram
  • 1 teaspoon summer savory leaves
  • 1 teaspoon thyme leaves
  • 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
  • salt to taste

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There is lots of slicing and dicing to do but with so many helping hands in the cooking club, its done in a jiffy.

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Click on the link below for the instructions.

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Pig Stomach Pepper Soup

Well, Ben has been bugging me for soup for the past few days. He has this craving for soup once in a while.

So, I made him one of his favourite soup, Pig Stomach Pepper Soup. This is a very simple soup with only 5 ingredients.

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This is a spicy soup as it uses a lot of whole white peppers.

Ingredients

  • 1 pig stomach
  • 1 chicken carcass (I used a leftover from a roast chicken which I left in the freezer)
  • 1 whole bulb of garlic
  • a handful of white pepper, depending on how spicy you like it.
  • salt to taste

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Click on the link below for instructions.

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Pickled Mustard and Tofu Soup

Ben complained that he had not had home made clear soup for some time. I know what he wants. He wants something with some meat and tofu in the soup — old fashioned Chinese soup. This is what I call the Pickled Mustard and Tofu Soup, or in Cantonese the Hum Choy Tou Fu Tong … is that spelt right? πŸ™‚

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One of the main ingredients is the chinese traditional tofu. This is the type that is a bit coarse, not like the smooth or soft type. The hum choy, or pickled mustard, is what give the soup it’s salty flavour. For meat, I bought some roasted pork feet from the chinese BBQ shop, you know, the ones that sell roasted pork. Roasted pork feet is cheap and costs only $1 each. I used three feet for this soup.

I know, I know … pork feet sounds gross. If you prefer you may use pork ribs, shoulder, etc. This soup tastes best with pork.

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Curried Red Lentil Soup

We were invited to Minoo’s Cooking Class in Caring Place yesterday. Minoo whipped up two dishes, Curried Red Lentil Soup and Jude’s Date, Nut and Chocolate Chip Cake.

Here is the recipe for the first dish, Curried Red Lentil Soup. Lentil is a good substitution for protein for vegetarian eater. Lentil is cheap compare to meat and it’s also high in fiber. It is very filling and yet light to our wallet.

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A bowl of creamy Curried Red Lentil Soup is great on a cold winter day.

Ingredients

  • 2 cups red lentils (or any lentil of your preference)
  • 2 quarts water (8 cups)
  • 2 tablespoons butter or margarine
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 2 stalks celery, chopped
  • 2 cloves garlic, chopped
  • a bunch of parsley
  • 1 teaspoon curry powder (more, if you like it spicier)
  • 1/2 teaspoon cumin powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon coriander powder (optional)
  • herb salt or salt and pepper to taste
  • sour cream or yogurt for garnishing

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Tomato Soup

During our weekly Cooking Club, we take turns showing two dishes. Earlier last week, it was Andreas turn. I have blogged about the Beef and Noodle dish earlier. This one is about her other dish which she called simply Tomato Soup.

This soup goes well with some crusty bread or crackers.

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Ingredients

  • 1 or 2 onions, chopped
  • 2 tablespoons of oil
  • 2-3 lbs tomatoes
  • 2-3 tablespoons tomato paste (optional)
  • 2 carrots, cut into coins
  • 1/2 bunch parsley, chopped
  • salt and pepper to taste

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