Rain Water · Lunch · Yang Deficiency
White pepper & ginger grass carp soup with rice vermicelli
A warming white pepper and old ginger broth with silky grass carp slices — a 25-minute lunch when you're working from home.
- 25 min
- Serves 2
- Quick soup
- Easy
WarmingWarms & dispels coldWarms stomach, clears damp
Why it suits you: Yang Deficiency means feeling the cold, with chilly hands and feet, and Rain Water's cool, clammy days easily weigh down digestive yang. A steaming bowl of peppery ginger fish soup warms you from the stomach outwards without leaving you overfull.
Method
Prep 10 min · Cook 15 min- 1Soak the vermicelli in warm water for 10 minutes until soft, then drain. Smash half the ginger and shred the rest; crush the peppercorns with the flat of a knife.
- 2Toss the fish gently with a little salt and the cornflour. Cut the choy sum into lengths and chop the coriander.
- 3Fry the smashed ginger and crushed pepper in the oil over low heat until fragrant, add 1 litre of water, bring to the boil and simmer for 5 minutes.
- 4Add the vermicelli and choy sum and cook for 2 minutes, then slide in the fish slice by slice. Turn off the heat, cover and leave for 2 minutes until the fish turns white.
- 5Season with salt, add the ginger shreds and coriander, and eat piping hot.
Cautions
- Halve the pepper if you have a stomach ulcer, sore throat or mouth ulcers. Grass carp can have small bones, so eat with care.
Chef's tips
- Ask the fishmonger to slice the fish thinly so it is ready to cook at home. Sea bass slices work too and cook in 1 minute.
The TCM view
Grass carp is sweet and warm and warms the stomach; white pepper is pungent and hot and dispels cold; old ginger is pungent and warm and disperses cold and damp; coriander is pungent and warm and wakes up the appetite. Choy sum is slightly cool, but the pepper and ginger balance it — warming and damp-dispelling without being drying.
