Beef Bone Soup with Radish and Carrot

Purpose:

To strengthen spleen and improve appetite; to nourish skin and darken hair; to clear heat and benefit yin.  This soup can help building a strong frame for children who eat it often.  It can nourish and strengthen the body without causing too much dry and heat, so it is suitable for people who are too weak to benefit from many other nourishing food.  This is an excellent food therapy for people who are emaciated, worried, insomniac, or have sleepless dreams, or people who have weak and sore back and legs, or young people who have early gray hair.

Material:

Beef bones                                                  750 g

Green radish                                                250 g
Carrot                                                         250 g  
Dried honey dates (ziziphus jujuba mill)        6     
Dried tangerine peel                                     10 g (1 peel of 1 tangerine)
Salt                                                             some
          

Note:

Beef bones are available from super markets or Chinese grocers, the same as those you might use for making stocks.  Most of them are large bones from the legs, so expect to cook a lot of bone marrows into the soup.  Green radish is available from some Chinese grocers.  You could replace them with white radish if the green variety is not available (see pictures below).  I have seen the white variety is some supermarkets, and sometimes it is called "Taikou".  Dried honey dates (蜜枣）are available from Chinese grocery stores or herb shops.  These are very sweet dates, and six of them are enough to produce a sweet soup.

Procedure:

a.   Peel green radish and carrots.  Rinse clean, and cut into thick chunks.  Soak to soften the tangerine peel, and then rinse to clean.   Also, rinse clean the honey dates.

b.   Boil about 10 cups of water.  Put the beef bones in to boil for 10 minutes.  Discard the water.  Wash the bones and the pot clean.  

c.   Put the cleaned bones back to the pot.  Add tangerine peel, honey dates and about 9-10 cups of water.  Let boil at medium heat for about 1.5 hours.  Add radish and carrots.  Bring to boil.  Let boil at medium heat for another 1.5 hours.  Remember to check the water level and add water as necessary, since boiling at medium heat could evaporate some water away.   

d.   Add some salt to flavor.  Ready to serve (see note below for the way to reduce oil in the soup).

        

Comment:

The honey dates and the carrots together give the soup a very pleasing color and sweet taste.  If you keep the soup in the refrigerator overnight, you will see a layer of white solid fat on the surface, which can be removed while cold.  In this way, you can greatly reduce the intake of fat and still enjoy the good taste and benefits of the soup.  The radish and carrot are very soft after the long cooking time.  Some meat and tendons originally attached to the bones could have fallen apart; they also taste sweet too.  Microwave to warm up the soup before serving.  When it comes to finish off the bones, help yourself with both hands and jaws too if needed.   

Green radish （青萝卜）

White radish （白萝卜）

Honey dates （蜜枣）