Double Boiled Winter Melon Soup - Featured recipe in Group Recipes

Winter Melon in Cantonese is call ?Tong Kuah? so a big winter melon is called ?Tai Tong Kuah?  This reminds me of a story durig my childhood.  My mum?s second step sister is one year younger than me so we were weekends playmates.  If I remember correctly, when she was 6 years old, she had to perform for her school concert. She had to sing a song and I clearly remember there was one line in the lyrics saying ?I am a ?Tai Tong Kuah?.  During the peformance, when she sang that line, everybody started to laugh but she started to cry!  She was basically a very shy and sensitive kid and I guess she felt ambarrassed when people laughed thinking that they were laughing at her.  Actually, they were laughing at the lyrics of the song not her.  The reason being when one calls you a ?Tai Tong Kuah? means you are a clumsy and stupid fellow.  However drinking this soup is not so stupid after all.  It has all the best ingredients in it and it is so delicious!  You practically do not need any other complimentary dish.  Just put white rice in the soup and you have sumptuous meal.

1.8 to 2 kg Winder Melon

5 or 6 dried scallops (whole)

3 dried shitake mushroom (finely diced)

4 water chestnut (finely diced)

150 gm chicken breast meat diced)

20gm young ginger (finely diced)

1 ts vegetable oil

1 ts sesame oil (optional)

1 cube chicken stock (without MSG) (if you have homemade chicken broth, then you replace water with it and you do not need the cube chicken stock)

Salt and white pepper to taste

Method

Preparation of Melon

Stand the melon on a flat surface.  Use a pencil to make markings around it about ¼ height of the melon from the top.  On a cutting board, place melon on its side and cut along the markings to make the lid.  Scoop out seeds and pulp until wall is about ¾ inches thick.  Discard the seeds and pulp and place melon in a heat proof dish. 

Preparation of ingredients:

Heat vegetable oil in wok and sauté ginger and dried mushroom till ginger is fragrant.  Put them in the melon. Then add all the other ingredients in the melon and cover them with water. Close the top and secure the lid with tooth picks. Transfer the dish on the rack in a large wok or steamer and steam over medium heat for 1 ? ½ hours.  Before serving, season with salt and white pepper and a drop or two of sesame oil.

How to serve:

You can serve the whole melon in the heat proof dish or you can scoop our the flesh of the melon into the soup and transfer everything into a serving bowl.