Sunday, June 13, 2010

Simple Labu Air (Calabash) Chicken Soup Recipe

Labu Air or Calabash (Lagenaria siceraria) in English belongs to the Cucurbitaceae family. They come in many shape and sizes. The one on the photo is the most common type and they are easily available in Malaysia. The bottle gourd is widely used as drinking water container and you can see many Chinese Deities statue or photos carrying this magical gourd. Labu Air itself is tasteless and we need to enhance the flavour by adding other ingredients like garlic, dried prawn or chicken stock. They can be fried or made into soup. I bought this medium size labu air from one of the hypermarkets and decided to cook soup with it.

Ingredients
Chicken Bones, from 1 whole chicken
Garlic, 3 pips, chopped finely, sauté in oil until brown
Labu Air (calabash), 1 medium, remove skin and cut into bite sizes
Water, 5 bowls
Salt to taste
Ang Cho (Chinese dried red dates), 5 pcs

Pour water in a pot and bring to a boil. Add in the chicken bones and ang cho(Chinese dried red dates) boil for around ½ hour. Put in the labu air chunks and boil for another 20 minutes. Add salt to taste. Sprinkle the garlic over the soup. Serve while still hot.

19 comments:

Sonia ~ Nasi Lemak Lover said...

this soup look simple and healthy !

suituapui said...

I like this! Very sweet...but prefer not to overcook...

I AM A BLOGGER said...

Labu air quite healthy~~
got a lot of vitamins^^
simple, but very healthy soup^^~~

Caroline said...

yea love this soup too!! going to have it once or twice in a month, :)

Somewhere in Singapore said...

Looks good...

Reanaclaire said...

Is this called "moe kwa" in cantonese? boil soup or stir fry with tauhoon is also nice, right?

Christine said...

sounds simple and delicious, will have to try it.

Angie's Recipes said...

A simple delicious soup!

cleffairy said...

Hmmm... this one interesting. Never tried before.

jen cheung said...

i think my mom made this soup before! it looks like a simple kind of soup right? hehehe. thanks for the recipe. :)

jen

manglish said...

i oso saw labu here in hiroshima but not as big as ours leh

Anonymous said...

I like most melon soup served Chinese style. I am familiar with one..tong kua soup...hehe.

penny aka jeroxie said...

I make this soup over here too. Now I know what thhat is called in English...

xin said...

my mom always fries it with dried shrimps :D

Alice Law said...

Wow~!! Should be sweet and healthy!^-^Thanks for sharing, do have a splendid day ahead!

mommyscchoo@gmail.com said...

Ooh.... now i know this is the way to cook this labu, it looks like 'winter melon'? I shall try next week. Tks for enlighten.

[SK] said...

i like this soup, simply simple, clear and healthy..

Ayie said...

it's called upo in the Phils. and it's nice sauteed wigth ground pork/beef & shrimp or simply boiled as soup with ginger and whole peppercorns

Idda Hashim said...

Wow great daddy, cooked for the kids. Can cooked for me..hahaha.. Iddahashim staying in Saudi Arabia n from JB.