Pictorial: Winter Melon Chicken Soup

[Dejah]

I agree with Ben that anchovies would not be a suitable substitute - wrong flavour. If you're serving it as a light soup, forego the oysters, mushrooms, conpoy. Just boil up then simmer some pork neckbones for a good broth, add slices of wintermelon, then silkened pork tenderloin slices at the last minute.

For the heartier version, I'd cut the melon into chunks with the rind on. This version would be "lo fau", with dried oysters, red dates, ginger,but no beans.

[udscbt]

Hello (2nd try: see postscript)

As promised, I went searching for dried scallops last Thursday. I went to 4 herbal/medicinal stores (where I find different kinds of ginseng for example): 2 in the 13th district and 2 in the 19th district (Belleville). The answers from three were no, we dont sell dried scallops; the fourth one said that they would have some in two weeks (in 250/500g packages) and call back. So, it seems hard but maybe not impossible to find dried scallops (or dried oysters for that matter) in Paris. Will check back in the middle of August. Maybe I will be able to make the Braised Abalone, Dried Scallops and Black Mushrooms dish after all.

While in Belleville, I found very large wintermelons sold by the slices so that is not a problem though, for the aesthetic reasons described in my 19-20 July posts., I may keep to my smaller ones,

Have a good day.

ps. For the different areas in Paris, you might be interested in the following excerpt (smaller than my previous one which apparently violated the Fair Use Guidelines": sorry about that) from a long article in Flavor and Fortune magazine:

"...In Paris, there are three main Chinese enclaves. The oldest but least visible is in the 3rd arrondissement, mostly a working area composed of small factories and wholesalers. The second is in the 13th arrondissement or the Chinatown of Paris. This is more correctly called Asiatown. Around 1975, this area began to be inhabited by the refugees from Southeast Asia. ... The third Parisian area is in the 19th arrondissement. This is perhaps the neighborhood which is the most Chinese. It is a mixture of overflow from the 13th arrondissement and other economic immigrants who came directly from China, in particular from Wenzhou in the Zhejiang Province which is south of Shanghai...."

Edited July 27, 2010 by udscbt (log)