Sing qua (Chinese Okra) soup

Sing qua (aka Chinese okra) is seasonal and we try to eat it as often as we can while in season. You can stir fry sing qua but I decided to make soup with it.

The ingredients for the soup: sing qua (1-2 pounds), 2 small pacakages of bean threads, 1 pound of ground pork and 1 package of preserved mustard green.


Peeled the sing qua and cut it diagonally, do a quarter turn and cut. Soak the bean threads in water for about 20 minutes or until soft. Marinate the ground pork w/ soy sauce, salt, sugar, white pepper, a dash of corn starch and a little bit of water.



When the water boils, add the package of preserved mustard green and the ground pork. Break up the ground pork in the broth. When it heats up, add the sing qua and cover the lid. When it boils, season to taste - may need to add a sprinkle of salt. Add bean thread, boils for another minute then turns off heat. If you want the bean thread to soak up the soup so it's like noodle then put the lid on for another 10 minutes. Enjoy!

Seaweed soup

Either hubby read my mind or I read his, I decided to make seaweed soup today. So off I went to get the necessary ingredients. Seaweed, get the sandless type - cost a little more but so worth it. Dried shrimp - get the larger ones, they are sweeter and adds a nice crunch to the soup. Tofu - get the soft kind. A package of preserved mustard greens - spicy and thin sliced.

This is probably one of the easiest soup to make. Just boil up a pot of water and add the ingredients in - start with the dried shrimp (wash or soak it a little first), followed by the preserved mustard greens (this is optional but I like that it adds flavor), then the tofu (I prefer the silk one but the soft one is ok too. Rinse with cold water then cut into 1" cubes) and finally the seaweed (a package comes with about 4 round pieces - you can use as much as you like).

You can use ground pork instead of or in addition to the dried shrimp for flavor. Another option is to use bouillion.

Simple and delicious - if you or your loved one like seaweed, give it a try.