Fish bone with Sichuan preserved veg soup

I like to use fish fillet for making children’s porridge but just buying the fillet alone is quite expensive. It is cheaper to buy the whole fish and get the fishmonger to fillet it. I then use the bones to cook this soup.

Sichuan preserved vegetable also called zha cai (榨菜 literally means "pressed vegetable") is a type of pickled mustard plant stem originating from Sichuan, China. The pickle is made from the knobby, fist-sized, swollen stem of the mustard green plant. The stem is first salted, pressed, and dried before being rubbed with hot red chili paste and allowed to ferment in an earthenware jar. This preservation process is similar to that used to produce Korean kimchi. When buying vegetables, it is better to choose the ones in the pot rather than from a can.

Ingredients

1 fish bone

1 tomato

1 sze chuan vegetable

1 soft tofu

2 slices of fish fillets

I am adding the fish fillet because we have extra guests joining us for dinner

Wash and slice the sze chuan vegetable

Soak it for about 20 minutes to remove the saltiness of the vegetable.

Put the vegetable and a few slices of ginger into the boiling stock

Cook on low for about an hour

Use a pair of scissors and cut the bones into fairly big pieces.

Wash and let it dry

Wash the fillets and let it drip dry

Deep fry the bones and keep it aside

Cut the fillet into smaller pieces and fry

Put the fried fish on a kitchen tissue to absorb the oil so that the soup will not be too oily

Put the fried fish and tomatoes into the soup and simmer for 30 minutes

Add the tofu

Simmer for another 30 minutes

Dish up and serve