Mouthing Off | Is snake soup as good for you as many Chinese believe? To me it’s hot and that’s enough
As Year of the Snake begins, Hong Kong snake restaurants are packed. Snake soup is to Chinese people what chicken soup is to other cultures
The start of the Year of the Snake in Hong Kong has seen snake restaurants packed with customers. This has little to do with the Chinese zodiac, though.
Obviously, the main ingredient is not normally found in the fresh meat section of any grocery store or wet market, so making your own at home is not recommended.
The recipe, like that of most soups, is not complicated. The soup usually contains slivers of mushroom, ginger, bamboo shoots, wood ear fungus and shredded snake meat. The meat requires cooking quite a long time to make it tender and easy to shred.
04:28
Hong Kong’s ‘snake queen’ tempts brave food lovers with unique menu
Unless you ask, you are not going to know from which snake breeds the meat comes – diners expect there to be at least two kinds. Most of the time, it is from venomous varieties such as the cobra and krait, but the meat of fat constrictors such as the rat snake is also used.
Novice customers often say the meat tastes like chicken, which is understandable because chicken meat is added by some restaurants as filler. The soup base is usually made from boiling snake, chicken and pork bones, with some cornflour slurry to thicken. Recommended condiments to top your broth are julienne lime leaves for freshness and bits of crisp fried dough for texture.
