Chinese Winter Melon Soup

Peels and cuts up the gourd being careful to select a serving size, and then the rest is cut into chunks and set aside.

In a separate bowl, add Japanese dry scallops and pours Shaoxing sweet rice wine over it and allows it to marinate for 6 hours until the wine is absorbed and the scallops crumble when handled.

In a boiling pot of water, add whole chicken parts, Jinhua ham, the white gourd chunks, pumpkin, and it is then simmered for 6 hours.

The chicken broth from the soup mixture is separated and set aside in a bowl, and the pumpkin is pureed over the broth and added into it and mixed. This makes the chicken broth even more golden.

While this is cooking, take the initial selected cut of Winter Melon and cuts a square well inside. This will be where the shredded scallops are placed.

Take the Winter Melon and fills it with the crumbled Japanese scallops

Put it in a steam basket to cook over the hot steam until the gourd is soft enough to cut with a spoon. This will take about an hour.

The golden broth is taken and put into a hot wok and then corn starch is added and stirred until it becomes a thick broth.

The cooked gourd with scallops is then inverted onto a plate and served with the golden broth over it.

Enjoy!

The name “winter melon” that is sometimes given to this plant is based on the Chinese name 冬瓜 or dōngguā. The wax gourd actually takes months of very warm weather to grow, despite its wintry name. In Chinese cuisine white gourds are used in stir fry or usually combined with pork or pork and or beef bones to make winter gourd soup, and is often served in a scooped out gourd, carved by scraping off the waxy coating. As with many kinds of sweeter gourds, white gourd is also chopped and candied and made into winter melon candy (táng dōng guā) which is commonly eaten at New Year festivals. Sometimes it is used as a filling for Sweetheart cake (lǎopó bǐng). It is also commonly used as the base filling in Chinese and Taiwanese mooncakes for the Moon Festival. Yummy!