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Silk Road vegetable hot pot
Serves SERVES 4 Starters and mains
Ingredients
- For the broth
- 2 celery hearts, chopped into 1cm pieces
- 2 leeks, sliced into 1cm rounds
- 4 carrots, scrubbed and sliced into 1cm rounds
- 3 parsnips, scrubbed and sliced into 1cm rounds
- 3 garlic cloves, unpeeled and squashed
- 2cm fat ginger root, sliced
- 100g fresh shiitake mushrooms, sliced
- pinch of chilli flakes
- 1tsp caster sugar
- 4tbsp light soy sauce
For the hot pot
- 6 sheets of fresh lasagne
- 16 small cauliflower florettes
- 8 stems of sweet stem broccoli stalks, peeled and cut into 3cm lengths
- 2 small courgettes, cut into 7mm slices
- 8 small oyster mushroom lobes
- 8 small white and brown button mushrooms
- ¼ Chinese leaf cabbage, cut into 4cm squares without separating the leaves
- 10g chopped fresh chives
- 4tsp Chinese garlic chilli sauce lamb skewers, to serve (optional)
Method
Place all the ingredients for the broth, except the soy sauce, in a large pan with 1tsp salt. Cover with 2.5 litres of cold water. Half cover and bring to a gentle simmer. Cook for 3 hours. Strain through a sieve set over a large bowl. Place the vegetables from the sieve back into the pan and cover with ½ litre of water. Simmer again for 20 minutes. Strain again into the same bowl and discard the vegetables. For a crystal-clear broth, leave the vegetables in the broth overnight and then strain. Add the soy sauce a little at a time to taste.
For the hot pot, cut the lasagne into six strips widthways and each strip into six squares. Cook in boiling salted water for 4 minutes. Drain. Refresh in cold water and drain again.
Thread the vegetables separately onto the bamboo skewers. Cook the vegetables lightly in the simmering broth in the following order: plunge the cauliflower and broccoli in for 1 minute; then add the courgettes for 1 minute; finally add the mushrooms for 1 minute.
Remove all vegetables and distribute among the bowls. Lower heat and add the cabbage to the broth for 1 minute. Place the cabbage in bowls.
Add the pasta to the broth to heat through. Lift the pasta out with a slotted spoon and place into each bowl. Make sure the broth is boiling hot before ladling it into the bowls. Scatter with chopped chives. Add some garlic chilli sauce. Eat right away.
You could also make meat skewers to serve with the vegetables but they will need to be grilled first (whereas the vegetable skewers are cooked by the heat of the soup). Lamb is a good choice: cut into bite-sized cubes, tossed with crushed garlic, skewered, seasoned, oiled and grilled for 4 minutes each side.
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