Wintermelon soup

Wintermelon is versatile - it can be cooked in a savoury soup or as a drink.

Wintermelon is not only 'cooling', it is good for detox too! If you understand Mandarin, you can read this site for more details. In general, cooking the wintermelon with the skin on is more effective if you are interested in the 'cooling' properties.

Wintermelon soup

Ingredients:

• 1 slice of wintermelon (keep the skin on)
• 250g pork ribs
• 3 chicken breast bones
• 1 handful dried shrimps
• 1 dried scallop
• 3 cloves garlic (keep the skin on)
• fish sauce to taste
• 1.5L water

Method:

1. Wash the skin of the wintermelon clean. Remove the seeds and cut the wintermelon into chunks.
2. Blanch the pork ribs and chicken bones.
3. Rinse the dried shrimps, garlic and dried scallop.
4. Place the pork ribs, chicken bones, dried shrimps, dried scallop (place in small soup bag), garlic and water into the slowcooker. Cook on LOW for about 6 hours for the soup base.
5. Transfer the soup base to a pot suitable for cooking on stovetop. Add the wintermelon and boil the soup on medium-high heat for about 30min (you should get a 'cloudy' soup base).
6. Sieve out the bones, garlic and dried shrimps. Put the soup through an oil filter to remove any extra oil.
7. Return the pork ribs (if desired), wintermelon and dried scallop (take out of soup bag) into the soup.
8. Bring the soup to a boil and add fish sauce to taste.
9. Dish and serve.

It's the first time Alicia's agreed to take wintermelon! :) She usually dislikes the texture of melons... :P She lapped up the soup of course...

For toddler's consumption:

• Remove the skin from the wintermelon before serving.