Tom Yum soup

I'd like to apologise for leaving such a big gap between my posts, but I was away on a family holiday and decided to leave my laptop at home (at first it felt like I was missing a limb, but after few days I realised I had made a great decision) and ever since I arrived back in Singapore I've been battling with one of the worst jet lags of my whole life (this explains why writing this post has taken so long).

I haven't forgotten my little promise to myself to try out some Asian dishes before I move back to London and as I got six cookbooks for my birthday (my friends know me way too well) and one of them was about soups I decided to treat us for a nice Asian soup. And as I was flicking through the soup book the Tom Yum soup caught my eye. And it did so because firstly the pictures looked really nice, secondly because the ingredient list was a lot shorter than I would have ever expected and thirdly I've really wanted to try making it at home and it was my luck that I did not have to shift through dozens of recipes on the internet to find the one that I wanted to try.

What I really love about Tom Yum is the interplay between flavours - its sweet, sour, salty and spicy all at the same time. To be honest, that tends to be so with most Thai dishes, but that doesn't make it any less special. Taking into account that everything in this soup is freshly made it is actually quite quick to make - the most time consuming part is making the prawn stock. It really fills you up and even in this hot climate it makes a perfect dish to finish your day. Also, the thing with home-made food is that you can easily vary the spiciness level (always feel free to reduce the amount of chilli you put in) and you can basically tailor the food to your liking. So, if you're looking for a nice oriental soup this one is definitely worth trying out.

Ingredients

(Makes 4)
- 300g fresh prawns
- 1.25l water (plus 1.5l for the stock)
- 2 stalks of lemongrass, thick part sliced diagonally
- 4-5 bird's eye chillies, bruised
- 3 thin slices of galangal
- 4 kaffir lime leaves, washed and torn
- 2-3 tsp fish sauce
- 75ml freshly squeezed lime juice
- Salt, to season
- 2 tbs olive oil

Directions
First make the prawn stock. For that remove and reserve prawn heads and shells, but leave the tails on. Devein the prawns by making a cut along their back and remove the vein. Also, doing this will make them curl up nicely during cooking.

To make the stock, heat the oil in a large pot over high heat. When its hot add the prawn shells and heads and stir fry for 1-2 minutes until they are bright pink. Then add 1.5l water and bring to boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 20 minutes (25 minutes max). Then use a potato masher to crush the shells against the bottom of the pot to get the maximum flavour. Strain the stock through a sieve and discard the shells and set it aside.

The pour the strained stock into a clean pot and add lemongrass, chillies, galangal and lime leaves. Bring this to boil over medium heat. Add the prawns to the pot and cook for 2 minutes (or until they are just cooked and curled). Switch off the heat and stir in the fish sauce.

Season the soup with lime juice (taste it so the sour-salty balance is perfect for you) and add little salt if necessary. Serve immediately and enjoy!

Recipe from C. Tan's book "Slurp"