The Canh Chua is type of Vietnamese soup, sweet and sour. I do love it because it’s a family dish, not found in restaurants.
Here is the recipe for 4 people
- 1 spoon of Tamarin soup base (or fresh tamarin crushed and mixed and filtered)
- I do like to add a bit of thai shrimp spicy sauce (optional)
- 1 litter of chicken broth (2 cans), and add some 1/4 to 1/2l water to it.
- 1 cup Pineapple cut in small chucks (you can use the juice too it it’s from a can)
- 2-3 Tomatoes sliced in quarters (1-2cm wide)
- 2 green onions (I like to slice then in long)
- Herbs
- Cilantro
- ngo gai (long herb for pho)
- Nuoc man sauce (a teaspoon or more)
- ground pepper
- Sugar (1 teaspoon or more)
- Meat :
- Chicken meatballs (chicken, panko, 1 egg, japaleno touch, rolled in balls, precooked on the over)
- or Shrimps
- or Catfish
- or Gio Song (pork ground)
If you do the chicken meatballs, prepare them ahead, keep in the fridge for a night or a couple hours, roll in small balls, and bake in the over on a sheet (both sides)
Once ready, in a soup pan, put the broth and tamarin, start to heat up. Add the thin chunks of pineapple and tomatoes. Bring to simmer. Later you add the onions and herbs, adjust the acidity with the nuocman and the sugar. You want to be lightly sweet from the pineapple, but not overwhelmed by the acidity of the tomatoes and fruit.
Then after 20m, you add the meat, the cilantro and thai spice, and let it simmer a bit more depending of how if meat cooked. The meatballs usually flots when ready. At the end adjust the sugar if needed. Serve with extra cilantro and thin cut green onions, and pour on rice in a bowl.