Friday, August 17, 2018

soup's on

What do you do when a coworker brings you a squash the size of a small child? First you (kindly) ask, "What on God's green Earth is that?" Next you better find something to do with it, because you know they're going to ask. Kidding. It was a fantastic surprise. It turns out that I was gifted a Vietnamese Opo Squash.

Work squash delivery.

An image search of that makes it pretty obvious what is mostly used for. Soup! Off to Pintrest we go! We decided on this recipe. We made a few adjustments based on personal taste and unintended grocery purchases. When you visit and Asian market and English isn't on many of the packages, well, you learn that Eric sees a picture of a roasted bird as a chicken. Even if it is actually, you find out later, is actually duck. So when you see 'duck' in our recipe, feel free to substitute the word 'chicken'. Though, I will say, I don't know that we made a wrong choice.

Garlic. I know you can smell this picture.

I-don! Udon! We all don for Udon!
That one's giving me the side-eye.

Cut-o the opo.

Presenting the Adventures with Eric Canh Bau Tom (aka. Vietnamese Opo Squash & Shrimp Soup). Note that this will feed you for a week. There will be leftovers. 

Vietnamese Opo Squash & Shrimp Soup

Ingredients
  • 1 Opo Squash (about 1 lb, peel, remove seeds, and cut into thick matchsticks
  • 1 lb. fresh shrimp (peeled, devained, and save peeled shelves for broth)
  • 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
  • 3 cloves garlic (minced)
  • 4 cups water
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 stewed duck broth cube
  • 1 package Udon noodles
  • 1 green onion (thinly sliced)
  • 1/8 teaspoon black pepper
Make
  • In a small pan, heat up vegetable oil. Add garlic and cook until fragrant (about 3 minutes).
  • In a medium-size pot add water, duck broth cube, salt, shrimp peels, garlic and bring to a boil.
  • Once water starts boiling, use a slotted spoon to remove the shrimp peels.
  • Add opo squash to the pot and cook until the squash turns translucent.
  • Add shrimp and noodles to the boiling pot and cook for two minutes.
  • Garnish with green onions and black pepper before serving.

It's looking ready!

You will find that the flavor is light, but satisfying and filling. The recipe could probably be tweaked a bit, but this was our first attempt at this. We didn't want to stray to far from the original recipe. Please give it a try and let us know if you added anything to the recipe that made it even better. We would love to try your take on the soup!


Get in my belly!

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