Happy
Chinese New Year everyone! All of the
Chinese people and those who has Chinese ancestors, like myself, celebrate this
rich traditions in the most meaningful ways….with food! And each food item is said to bring specific
types of good fortune in the coming year. As rice, tangerines and oranges for Good luck, spring rolls, dumplings, and whole fish for wealth and prosperity, long noodles for longevity, duck for happiness and pork for good health, they are sure on everyone’s wish list. I think by eating these specific of good tasty
food on the New Year with its significant meanings is just a win-win
situation.
Since
noodles represent long life and duck represent happiness, I guess eating duck
noodle soup on the Chinese New Year would give me a long happiness life, hopefully! I determine to continue cooking and eating lucky food that symbolize good fortune for a couple of weeks. Let's see if I can do it.
This bowl of duck noodle soup is pretty easy to
make since the cooked duck can be purchased at the Chinese restaurant where
they are also selling yummy dim sum.
When you buy the soy-braised duck, don’t be afraid to ask for a cup of
sauce by telling them that you want to make duck soup. They are happy and willing to fulfill your
request. Just ask! Then, all you have to do is to add some
more water to dilute that condense thick soy sauce and add some cloves,
cinnamon sticks, star anise, fresh ginger, and daikon to improve the broth and
seasoning some more with brown sugar for your liking. Then,
serve the soup with rice or egg noodles and veggies of your choices. For the use of fried garlic, it can be
skipped if you don’t have it. But it
will give the bowl tremendously the best flavor ever.
What you need: *Can be
served up to 4 -6 servings depends on the serving size
1 large store-bought
soy-braised duck
1 cup
seasoned dark soy sauce (that come with the duck)
1 stick
cinnamon
2 star anise
2 cloves
8-10 cups
water (or more if the sauce is thicker and salty, mine used 8 cups)
2 cups
daikon, peeled and quartered (about a half of a medium daikon)
5-6 rounds
fresh ginger slices
Cooked
noodles of your choice – rice noodles, egg noodles, or even vermicelli noodles
– cook noodles accordingly to the package
Finely
chopped green onion
Cilantro
leaves
Blanched Spinach
or Chinese broccoli
Beansprouts
Fried garlic
with oil
Ground white
pepper
Fresh red
chili – optional
Condiments
– vinegar, chili sauce, or dried red chili flakes
1. Making the broth:
-- Pick out the duck’s head, neck, and legs from other parts of
the duck (see pictures)
-- In a large
pot, add seasoned dark soy sauce, duck’s head, neck and legs, water, star
anise, cloves, cinnamon stick, daikon, and ginger into the on the medium high
heat and let it boils for 25 minutes or until the daikon is cooked. Notes: Add more water if needed since the
broth will reduce during the boiling.
*In
addition, seasoning with soy sauce or/and brown sugar if the taste of the broth
is too weak as the broth should be a little salty from the soy sauce and a
little sweet from brown sugar. Daikon
and ginger as well as spices really help improve the broth. Mine was just right and didn’t need more
seasoning. Again, the taste of the broth
depends on the sauce you got from store when you bought the duck.
2. Resemble the bowl:
-- Add a handful of cooked noodles of your choice in a serving bowl
-- Add blanched spinach or
Chinese broccoli, or other greens of your choice – kale, broccoli, zucchini,
cabbage, etc.
-- Add a few pieces of duck
meat
-- Add 1/2 teaspoon or more
fried garlic + oil
-- Ladle the broth over as much
or as little as you wish
-- Sprinkle with ground white
pepper, green onion, cilantro leaves, and some beansprouts
-- Serve with condiments as an
extra seasoning as your preferred taste