Seafood Porridge
I made this seafood porridge (海鮮粥) with scallops, clams and prawns in 20 minutes. It is sumptuous and easy to make.
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Short-cuts. The night before, I tabaoed (takeaway) 2 packets of cooked rice from a Chinese food stall so that I don’t have to cook the rice (yes, I am lazy). The seafood soup base is also very easy, made up of chicken stock & water. The clams and prawn heads provided the much needed seafood umami depth to the soup.
The seafood. In my bowl, there are clams, scallops and prawns. I used bigger scallops and prawns, and their cooking time synced nicely with the clams, which is about 4 minutes. You can also substitute with other seafood such as mussels, squid and sliced fish.
The rice soaks up the soup very quickly, so do cook and serve the porridge while it is piping hot.
Seafood Porridge Recipe
You can substitute the prawns, scallops and clams in this recipe with other seasonal seafood such as sliced fish, mussels and oyster meat.
You can also add a few Chinese lettuce or coral lettuce (生菜) at the last step, if you like some greens in your bowl.
Ingredients:
- 15-20 local clams (such as asari, manilla or “lala”)
- 350 ml chicken stock
- 400 ml water
- 4 large scallops if using frozen, thaw before use
- 4 large prawns de-veined, shelled leaving head and tail intact
- 4 thinly sliced ginger
- 2 tbsp rice wine or sake
- 2 servings cooked white rice
- 1 tbsp chopped coriander
- white pepper powder to taste
- 2 tsp crispy garlic oil optional
Directions:
- Clean and de-grit the clams. Scrub the clams with a hard-bristle brush. Put clams in a bowl of water with 1 tsp sea salt. Let the clams soak in the salted water for 1-2 hours, allowing the sand and grit to be purged out. Discard the water and rinse the clams. Set aside.
- Make seafood soup. In a soup pot, bring chicken stock and water to a boil. Add prepared clams, scallops, prawns and ginger. Cover and cook for about 3-4 minutes, or until the clams are all opened. Discard any clams that remain closed. Add rice wine during the last 15 seconds of cooking.
- Serve. Add cooked rice to two serving bowls. Ladle the hot seafood soup over the rice. Garnish with coriander, white pepper and garlic oil. Serve immediately.