Tom Ka With Tofu (Or Tom Yam) Soup

photo by Gods_sugarcookie

- Ready In:
- 20mins
- Ingredients:
- 15
- Serves:
-
6-8
ingredients
- 4 tablespoons fish sauce
- 1 (12 ounce) can coconut milk (Not the reduced fat kind. Fat makes it taste DELICIOUS!)
- 2 cups chicken stock (I use the chicken stock paste that comes in little jars. It has no MSG and is all-natural, without t)
- 2 cups water
- 2 sprigs lemongrass, root (two inch sprigs, chopped into tiny slices)
- 1 kaffir lime leaf (or other lime leaf, tossed in whole) (optional)
- 1 lime, juice of
- 4 garlic cloves (or more depending on your preference)
- 1 (8 ounce) package silken tofu, drained and cut into 1/2 inch cubes
- 1⁄2 cup shrimp (optional)
- 1⁄2 cup mushroom (Any kind, such as white, shiitake, portobello, etc. I mostly use shiitake because I keep a giant con)
- 1 teaspoon red chili paste (I like Sriracha brand. Add more to taste.)
- 1 tablespoon grated fresh gingerroot
- 1⁄4 cup chopped cilantro (for garnish)
- 1⁄4 cup Thai basil, for garnish (optional)
directions
- Throw everything in a pot and boil for about 10 minutes, saving shrimp until last (if you are using shrimp--I often just make this vegetarian).
- Garnish and serve.
- To make Tom Yam instead of Tom Ka, do everything the same, except substitute more chicken stock to replace the coconut milk.
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Reviews
-
Great soup, thank you so much!! I used lime zest instead of the leaf and it still turned out fine. We grow fresh basil in our garden so when I spooned the soup into the bowls I just sprinkled on the basil right over it and it tasted great! The only thing about this soup is that we couldn't eat too much of it without kind of feeling squeamish from all that rich coconut flavor, but that's just us. :) I would suggest serving this as an appetizer. Thank you again!
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This was one of the best Asian type soups I have tried in while and I am a soup freak. Could not stop eating it! Absolutely delicous. The only changes I made was to add about 300 g of an assortment of shrimp, squid, clams. I had the kifir lime leaves but they are hard to find. I would sub with lime zest...it does kick the soup up a notch... so add it. Thanks for sharing..it does bring back memories of Thailand too. Catherine
RECIPE SUBMITTED BY
Tumerica is a freelance writer who has written essays that have appeared in the Santa Barbara News-Press, and in Santa Barbara’s arts and entertainment paper, The Independent. She regularly writes book reviews of graphic design and other non-fiction books for Technical Communication, the journal of the Society for Technical Communication. And she has written articles on writing for other writers, appearing in The Solitary Scrivener, and T-Zero.
Tumerica is a fanatic foodie and gourmet cook who has placed in a cooking contest and is working on a curry cookbook. She has published food articles for The Gastronome, the American magazine for the Chaîne des Rôtisseurs. She also pens the occasional restaurant reviews, but admits to enjoying doing the research more than the actual writing. She also writes food articles for her blog at http://tumerica.blogspot.com with a focus on learning the underlying principals behind cooking, rather than slavishly following recipes.
Tumerica is a published poet, with her works appearing in the zine, Renaissance, and in a poetry anthology published by Glass Tesseract. She has recently finished her first book of poetry, Red and Green: On Passion and Ecocentrics, and is currently searching for a publisher.
She has had many incarnations in her job history. Among her titles have been: bassoonist, saxophonist, Jazz and Blues singer, graphic designer, science journal editor, narrator, teacher, artist, homeless shelter manager, and art model.