Cooking with Shonte': Tom Yum Soup

Tom Yum Soup

Serves 2-3

A classic Thai dish. Can be an appetizer or entree. This is also a great dish if you don't have much of an appetite or nauseated, because it's light and fresh.

Ingredients

• 1lb jumbo deveined uncooked shrimp or prawn (can be made without shrimp if vegan or vegetarian)
• 2 ½ cups of shrimp stock or 1 tablespoons of shrimp bouillon (can be replaced with vegetable broth if vegan or vegetarian) Knorr is my favorite brand
• 1 lemongrass stalk- mainly found in your local international market  (If you can't find lemon grass stalk, you can substitute it with lemon or lime *zest)
• 3 tablespoons of lime juice or 1 lime to squeeze juice
• 1 tablespoon of fish sauce (can use soy sauce if vegan or vegetarian)
• 4 fresh thai chili peppers (optional) -found mainly in your local international market (I love spice, and traditionally its a spicy dish)- If you cannot find Thai chili peppers use serrano peppers, crushed red pepper flakes, or chili garlic sauce
• 4 cloves of garlic or 2 tablespoons of minced garlic
• 1 tablespoons of ginger powder/minced/fresh (cut 1 inch of fresh ginger)
• 1 handful fresh sliced white mushrooms
• 1 handful of fresh chopped cilantro- can use 1 tablespoon of dried cilantro
• 4 chopped scallions
• 8 cups of water
• Salt and pepper to taste (I typically use pink  himalayan salt to reduce sodium content)
• 3-4 Instant ramen noodles packets (optional)-for entree portion

Tools

• Large pot
• Cutting board
• Chef knife
• Large spoon
• Bowl

Directions

• In a large pot bring 8 cups of water and shrimp stock to a boil
• While water is boiling chop up 2 thai chili peppers, garlic, 2 scallions, and ginger(remove skin from fresh ginger and chop up about 1 inch of root)
• Slice mushrooms thin
• Lightly smash lemon grass stalk and roughly chop
• When the  water is boiling add fish sauce, lemongrass, garlic, half of lime juice squeezed (or 2 tablespoons), ginger, thai chili peppers ,and scallions to water and reduce heat to low then cover for about 10-15 minutes
• Prepare shrimp, remove shell but keep tail on, season with salt and pepper
• After the broth has been boiling for about 10-15 minutes add shrimp and sliced mushrooms to broth and cook for another 5-10minutes (shrimp should be pink and opaque when done), season the soup to taste by adding more salt, pepper, and fish sauce
• Finely chop the rest of the thai chili peppers, scallions and cilantro
• Discard lemongrass stalk from the broth and garnish each bowl topped with thai chili peppers, scallions, cilantro, a squeeze of lime
• Enjoy!! This also may be eaten over ramen noodles (buy instant ramen noodle packets and throw away seasoning  packets) for a more hearty dish - cook ramen noodles separately in a pot of boiling water for 3 min (*al dente), do not allow noodles to sit in water too long otherwise they will get a mushy texture

*Zest- the peel of the fruit removed by grating the skin

*Al Dente-tender to chew but firm enough to bite