This is the season for Pear Soup, which is a favourite of mine. As temperatures drop, drinking pear soup is the recommended way to eat pear which is believed to be a cooling food in Chinese Medicine. Pears sooth coughs, detoxify, and moisten both the lungs and throat. Given autumn is related to the Lung and Large Intestine organ energies, this delicious soup is perfect for this time of the year.
Because pears are cooling, you can opt to add warming ingredients such as cinnamon, though they are not part of the traditional recipe.
Pear Soup is a tonic and we also enjoy it as a dessert soup or tong sui (sugar water, literally). The other ingredients are also health-boosting. Red dates are good for the blood and goji berries, the eyes.
Chinese Dessert Pear Soup (Tong Sui)
Ingredients
- 3 or 4 ripe Asian pears, cut in chunks
- honey, maple syrup or your preferred sweetener, added to taste (traditionally the Chinese use rock sugar)
- dates and/or goji berries (add as much as you like)
- 1.5 litres of filtered water
Making Chinese Pear Soup
- add the pear, dates, and goji berries to boiling water
- simmer for at least one hour (traditionally it’s cooked for six to seven hours)
- add your sweetener
Alternatively you can leave your pears whole. Doing this requires a longer cooking time. Can’t find Asian pears? Go with what you love!
photo credit : JJ Harrison (jjharrison89@facebook.com)
