In Chinese, the same word is used for "carrot" and "radish", which is why the Singaporean "fried carrot cake" doesn't actually have Western "carrots" in them, but rather shredded radish.
But besides the linguistic association of these two veggies, there is also the gastronomical association in Chinese culture. Carrot and radish is often used together in cooking, especially in soups.
Anyway, carrots aside, what I didn't know was that there were quite a number of varieties of radish proper until I had this home-made soup, which I'll take the liberty to name the "four carrot soup".
As you can see, there's the usual white radish and orange carrots. But there are also these green and brownish roots too. The green cubes are actually a green variety of radish. It had a weaker flavour but firmer texture than the white one. This is how they look like in the supermarket:
What I was most intrigued by was the brownish-grey root. At first I thought it was burdock or some other root. Its texture was different - slightly firmer and with a refreshing mild crunch to the bite, but also smoother on the palate.
Turns out it is what most people know as "chye poh" - the salty pickles which people love in their fried carrot cake or omelettes. I never knew that chye poh was actually a pickled radish!
In this case, the whole preserved radish was used, rather than the finely chopped version.
Apparently, after boiling it in soup for some time, it absorbed the water and became firmer. Besides that, its salt diffused into the soup, making it much less salty, enough to eat it on its own. And the diffused salt and chye poh flavour also added to the flavour of the soup.
Overall, this was a wonderful dish - nice variety of colours and textures, mostly natural flavours, and made from simple ingredients - no need to add salt.
You should also try such clear vegetable soups cold! This one had a really refreshing and light quality to it... and radishes and carrots produced this refreshing cold pop in my mouth.
Ingredients:
But besides the linguistic association of these two veggies, there is also the gastronomical association in Chinese culture. Carrot and radish is often used together in cooking, especially in soups.
Anyway, carrots aside, what I didn't know was that there were quite a number of varieties of radish proper until I had this home-made soup, which I'll take the liberty to name the "four carrot soup".
Turns out it is what most people know as "chye poh" - the salty pickles which people love in their fried carrot cake or omelettes. I never knew that chye poh was actually a pickled radish!
In this case, the whole preserved radish was used, rather than the finely chopped version.
Overall, this was a wonderful dish - nice variety of colours and textures, mostly natural flavours, and made from simple ingredients - no need to add salt.
You should also try such clear vegetable soups cold! This one had a really refreshing and light quality to it... and radishes and carrots produced this refreshing cold pop in my mouth.
Ingredients:
Carrots
White radish
Green radish
Chye poh
A little bit of brown sugar (one tea spoon for a big pot)
Mushrooms (optional)
Chicken with bones (optional)
Pork bones (optional)
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