A Mildly Spicy Soup

Hello Foodies!

For the past few days, we've been experiencing some pretty cold weather. There's rain and for some of you, snow. I haven't been sleeping without a blanket for a few weeks since the weather started lowering its temperature, and so today I decided to make a slightly spicy soup for lunch.

The ingredients for spicy soup is simple for my version, as you already know by now that I cook without oil and additional flavouring. However, I shall  share with you the different ways of making this spicy soup, either more spicy or less spicy, depending on how you like it.

Ingredients are:

a. Chinese Cabbage - this is the main ingredient for this soup.

b. Half a carrot - Just for the sweet taste as I do not like sugar in my food. You may have more carrots if you want it sweeter.

c. One red chili - I use a whole chili for the spicy effect.

As usual, since I am on my 5-minute meal programme, I added water and just boil it all on low fire over the stove for about 10 minutes while I showered. The result is a fragrant, spicy soup that has a little tinge of sweetness thanks to the carrot. This one is not too spicy yet, and you just feel a little "hot" on the surface of your tongue. Not to the extent of emitting steam from your ears, but if you wish to have something more spicy than this, you may try the below option in place of the single red chili that I use.

Option A:

Fresh Ginger and Chili -This one is good if you feel that you are somewhat bloated, with air in your tummy. You may have fresh ginger sliced in for the soup, or you may grind to get the juice to add in. A young ginger will not to as spicy as an old ginger.

Option B:

Shallots and Chili - This one helps if you do not like ginger. The taste is pretty amazing, and adds on something for you to chew on. If you use onion instead of shallots, choose the variety with the purplish red peel instead of the yellowish brown peel. The yellowish brown ones are sweet instead of spicy.

Option C:

Shallots, Small Chili, Fresh Ginger, Garlic and Lemon Juice - This one is the ultimate spicy version. The shallots, small chili, fresh ginger and garlic to be cut to small pieces and grind them with the grinding stone. A blender will only cut it to smaller pieces but not bring the effect of the grinding. When you grind all these into a thick paste, add and mix in the lemon juice, just a little bit. This paste you can keep refrigerated for a week or more. When you want to make it into soup, you add this paste to the water and your ingredients, and you boil them. You may also use this paste to cook with meat or use it as a dip.

I leave it to you to choose how hot you wish it to be. For me, my simple version of single chili is good enough.