I found this little ripper of a recipe in Cuisine magazine years ago. I used to make this all the time when I was at uni and my (fellow foodie) buddy Ants would come over for dinner on a Sunday night. More often than not, I’d make this and we’d devour it. I also used to make this for the family I used to nanny for (I’d trek to work with my food processor tucked under one arm as they didn’t have one). The kids used to polish this off.
I have also successfully made it substituting the fish with chicken (thighs or breasts, both work!). If you stay true to the recipe and use fish, be aware that the fish really takes hardly any time at all to cook. Note, you will need a food processor to make this.
Serves 4 (smallish servings – if you are a big eater, this will do 3 large portions!)
Ingredients
Dumplings
400g firm white fish (don’t use fish that’s been frozen, the dumplings go too wet…)
1 egg white
1 teaspoon toasted cumin seeds (dry fry them in a frying pan)
1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh ginger
1/2 cup coriander leaves and stalks – chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
Soup
3 tablespoons oil
5 cloves garlic, finely chopped
3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh ginger
1 onion, finely chopped
1 small cinnamon quill
1 teaspoon ground turmeric
2 red chillies (or to taste), finely sliced
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp honey or sugar
400g can Italian tomatoes in juice, puréed
400g can coconut milk
200g packet hoikken noodles
2 tablespoons lime juice
coriander leaves for garnish
To make the dumplings
- Put everything into a food processor and purée until smooth-ish.
- Form small handfuls of mixture into golf sized balls and put on a plate then into the fridge whilst you make the soup
To make the soup
- Heat the oil over moderate heat in a saucepan and add the garlic, ginger, onion, cinnamon, turmeric, salt and chillies. Sauté without browning until the onion is completely soft.
- Add the tomatoes, coconut cream and honey/sugar (necessary to balance out the acidity of the tomatoes) and bring to the boil.
- Cook noodles as per back of packet in another saucepan.
- Add dumpling/balls to the coconut/tomato soup and simmer for approx 5 minutes until the fish dumplings are cooked, take care not to cook any longer than this as the fish will go dry! Add the lime juice. Have a taste – if it needs more seasoning – go for it!
- At this point, your noodles should be done! Drain and put in noodle bowls and top with the soup with a dumplings in bowls. Garnish with coriander leaves.
