First Snow: Vietnamese Opo & Chicken Dumplings Soup (Canh bầu bí đỏ mồng tơi nấu giò gà)
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| Vietnamese Opo & Chicken Dumplings Soup |
They say it's two meters per second.
The average terminal fall velocity of a snowflake.
Have you ever looked up when it was snowing, watched flakes coming down upon you, silver and dark against the skylight, and then - ...! it's landed on your eye, in the middle of a blink? I wonder if memories flow by as fast. Sometimes they fall faster than I can catch them.
Is it snowing yet, where you are?
First snow always brings the city at a standstill. In Montreal's case, past the initial wonder that snow falling soundlessly in the night always ushers in, this also means a lot of traffic jams, with the whole public transit system becoming painfully sluggish.
Our first snow of the season draped on Montreal on the third week of November, giving the impression of Jacques Cartier Square being a giant snow globe. Overnight, the grassy parkways were rendered foreign, covered snug by a thick blanket of corn snow, the naked trees lining the sidewalks swelling into soft silhouettes of themselves. At the office, my coworkers took turns grimacing at the kitchen window; from that vantage point, the whirlpool of snowdrifts was almost abstract, a film about miserable weather on an oddly deserted Monday morning street.
After that week, Old Montreal lost its golden yellows, rich brick reds and bursts of basilica blue. Whatever colors we had migrated south for the winter, like flocks of snow geese, although without as much fanfare and the cacophony of honking.
It's a funny thing, first snow. We go to bed in a kind of world, and wake up to strikingly different one. As long as I can remember, my parents always cringed when first snow arrived because that meant shoveling work and slippery driving, but me? I loved it. And they'd indulge me. I'd waddle outside wrapped up in layers of clothing like a double-stuffed marshmallow, crash in a bank of white that snow-removal trucks rammed up against the front of our house, and just look up. I could stare in awe, sleepily, at one flake coming down, and another, and another, slowly and doggedly, for such a long time. Time seemed to stand still then, and in my puffed up coat and woolen cap I'd curl up around my imagination and old memories, and daydream away the chill.
Sometimes, in the turmoil of work, I still like to step outside, into those few degrees of separation. Before stinging January winds lash into town, lifting snowfalls and slamming them down on the pavement, the cold can be such a relief. And inevitably, I think back. There is a nostalgic quality to snow, and as it encapsulates the city I find myself getting lost in the memories it awakens.
This is a soup that triggers tasty memories from years back. As my Dad used to have a garden chock-full of opo squashes every summer, this has been, early-on, one of my Mom's master recipes. I remember hanging on the kitchen counter and watching her stuff carved out opo squashes and bitter melons with ground pork, adding a final splash of fish sauce as I wrinkled my nose in olfactory offense.
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| Opo Squash :) ...I never noticed how smooth its outer skin was until I chopped up a bumpy Kabocha squash right before slicing this one up |
In residence, I modified her recipe by adding a tidbit more variety of vegetables, and by bending under Western influences to morph the original stuffed meat into chicken and shrimp dumplings. The seasoning has essentially remained the same, however, so it still feels like a sip of memories when I swallow a spoonful. It's quite perfect for a snowy day.
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| Kabocha squash :) |
Ingredients:
6 cups chicken broth
350g opo squash, peeled and cut into chunks (~ 1/2 medium squash)
350g kabocha squash, peeled and cut into chunks (~ 1/2 medium squash)
225g Malabar spinach/mồng tơi, rinsed and cut into fat strips
75g yellow onion, sliced finely (1/2 medium onion)
Salt to taste
Olive oil
Chicken dumplings:
250g chicken breast, semi-frozen, semi-thawed
1/2 teaspoon white granulated sugar
1 teaspoon potato starch
3/4 teaspoon / 3g single-acting baking powder (ie.: Alsa baking powder)
100g shrimp, peeled, deveined and cut into small bits
1/4 teaspoon sesame oil
1/4 teaspoon white granulated sugar
1 clove garlic, finely minced
1/4 teaspoon salt
A hefty dose of ground black pepper
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| Mise en place! From center-top counter-clockwise: Chicken broth, Kabocha squash, chicken & shrimp dumpling paste, Opo squash, onion slices, Malabar spinach |
Preparation:
1. Cut the semi-frozen chicken breast into chunks.
2. Except for the shrimp bits, put all the ingredients for the chicken dumplings in a food processor. If you have time to freeze your chicken breasts before semi-thawing and using them, it will allow you to have chewier dumplings - as if they have a bit of a bounce to their bite. If you don't have time to freeze the chicken, they will still be cohesive and the texture will still be good, so don't sweat it.
Blend until you have a smooth, sticky paste. Then, add the bits of raw shrimp and mix with a wooden spoon to uniformly combine everything. Cover and set aside in the fridge until needed.
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| Chicken & Shrimp Dumpling Paste |
3. In a large pot, pour a bit of olive oil and turn the heat to medium-high. When fumes start appearing, turn the heat down to medium and add the yellow onion slices. Stir-fry them until they soften and turn golden brown. Pour the chicken broth in and keep the heat on medium until it start simmering.
4. Season the broth to taste, adding salt as needed. Add the opo squash and the kabocha squash cubes, and keep simmering until they are fork-tender (~10-12 minutes).
5. While the squashes cook, shape the dumplings. In a non-stick pan, heat up some olive oil. Then, take a spoonful of chicken dumpling paste and use a second spoon to cover it, lightly pressing and shaping it into an oval shape. Repeat this process until all the dumpling paste has been used up.
6. On high heat, quickly sear the dumplings in the pan, just enough so that they are slightly browned (~1-2 minutes). Remove from the pan and transfer to the chicken broth pot.
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| Seared & Browned Chicken Dumplings |
7. Cook the dumplings until they are no longer pink inside.
8. When the opo squash and kabocha squash are close to be fork-tender, add the Malabar spinach strips. It will look like you're stuffing a forest into the pot, but they deflate very, very quickly. Promise. Cook for an additional ~3-4 minutes.
9. Taste and season for taste one last time. Add a pinch of black pepper for good measure. And nom :) (I like serving this with rice).
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