Hot & Sour Broth with Prawns

So here we have the last of the meals made from one simple chicken! This is a healthy, clean-tasting soup using the carcass and bones of the aforementioned chicken for the stock which is of course the base for the broth itself.

You can play around with this to suit your taste, omitting the prawns for something plainer, or even substituting for some shredded chicken if you like.

You could actually use a very good ready made chicken stock if you really felt the need but I do think that it is best made with the chicken bits and bobs. So just keep it mind then for when you next have a roast chicken.


Hot & Sour Broth with Prawns
serves 2

1 chicken carcass and bones
1.5 litres water
2 large red chillies, deveined and deseeded & sliced
2.5 cm knob of fresh ginger, peeled and sliced into matchsticks
2 sticks of lemongrass, trimmed & outer leaves discarded
6 lime leaves, bruised
50g palm sugar
8 raw tiger prawns, peeled
8 shiitake mushrooms, sliced
juice of 1 lime
2 tbsp fish sauce
small bunch of coriander, roughly chopped (including stalks)

Put the chicken carcass and bones in a saucepan, cover with the water and simmer for about an hour. Strain, discarding the bones and add the stock back to the pan, bringing it back up to a gentle simmer.

Using a pestle and mortar pound the chillies, ginger and lemongrass. What you want is to bruise them by giving them a good bashing - you don’t want a paste. Add these, plus the lime leaves, to the simmering stock.

Add the palm sugar, leave for 5 minutes or so and then throw in the prawns and mushrooms. Continue to simmer for a couple of minutes until the prawns are pink and just cooked through.

Finally add the lime juice, fish sauce and coriander. Give it a good stir then serve immediately in bowls.