As one of the delicious dishes in Vietnamese cuisine, chicken vermicelli soup is favored by people for its fragrant and rich broth. Instead of going to restaurants or eateries, you can showcase your cooking skills by making chicken vermicelli soup at home with a simple recipe to treat your family over the weekend.
The recipe for chicken vermicelli soup is not difficult, even for those who only have basic cooking skills. Eating chicken vermicelli soup on a rainy day will help you feel more relaxed, comfortable, and warm. In just under an hour, you can complete a steaming, fragrant bowl of chicken vermicelli soup that anyone would crave upon smelling its aroma.
Ingredients and Preparation
You need to prepare the following ingredients, enough for 4 servings:
Ingredients to prepare:
- 200g vermicelli
- Half a chicken
- Bones
- Wood ear mushrooms, 1 onion
- Seasonings including pepper, salt, seasoning powder, fish sauce
- Green onions, Vietnamese coriander, cilantro, shallots.
Steps to Prepare Ingredients
Here are the steps to prepare the ingredients before cooking chicken vermicelli soup:
- Thoroughly wash the chicken with water.
- Thinly slice the onion, wash the bean sprouts, finely chop the cilantro and green onions, and julienne the wood ear mushrooms.
- Roast about 4-5 shallots slightly on a grill and then peel them.
- Place the chicken in a large bowl and marinate with a little pepper and 1 teaspoon of seasoning powder. Mix well and let it sit for about 15 minutes to absorb the flavors.
Recipe for Successfully Cooking Chicken Vermicelli Soup on Your First Try
To cook a delicious chicken vermicelli soup, you need to go through two main steps: cooking the vermicelli and preparing the broth. Here are the detailed steps for preparation and cooking that you can refer to:
How to Cook Vermicelli
Vietnam is known for its intricate and flavorful cuisine. From rice flour and tapioca flour, people have created vermicelli with a moderate chewiness that is incredibly appetizing. Vermicelli can be used to make soup or spring rolls.
The color of vermicelli is not as white as the noodles in Hue beef noodle soup, nor as white as the noodles typically eaten with grilled meat, but rather translucent. When uncooked, vermicelli has an opaque white color, and it turns transparent once cooked.
Vermicelli can be made from mung beans or brown rice, but the main ingredient is still rice flour. Nowadays, people have also invented ways to produce vermicelli from mung beans and sweet potatoes. However, rice vermicelli remains the most common. Before cooking, you need to wash the vermicelli in clean water, then soak it in water for about 5 minutes, and drain it.
Preparing the Broth
Chicken vermicelli soup broth can be prepared in various ways to suit different tastes. Each region may have its own variation of chicken vermicelli soup, and the spices used will also differ accordingly. You can simmer pork bones to make the broth sweeter and clearer.
Steps to Cook the Broth:
- Place a pot on the stove and add 1.5 liters of water. Once the water boils, add the peeled roasted shallots and the chicken. Simmer on low heat for about 30 minutes.
- Add the julienned wood ear mushrooms, 2 tablespoons of seasoning powder, and 1 tablespoon of salt to the pot. Stir well to dissolve the spices.
- Use a chopstick to pierce the chicken; if the chopstick goes through the meat easily, the chicken is cooked.
- Turn off the heat and remove the chicken and shallots into a bowl. You can add 1 teaspoon of fish sauce to enhance the broth’s aroma.
- Taste the broth and adjust the seasoning as needed.
- Shred the simmered chicken into bite-sized pieces.
Finished Dish
When ready to serve, blanch the drained vermicelli in the broth and place it in a bowl. Add some shredded chicken, onion, and wood ear mushrooms. Finally, ladle the broth over the vermicelli, and garnish with cilantro, fried shallots, and green onions.
The finished chicken vermicelli soup is rich and flavorful. The chicken is tender and delicious, blending perfectly with the mildly sweet broth from the simmered bones and meat. The vermicelli is slightly chewy, making it very enjoyable to eat. You can have chicken vermicelli soup for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. This dish is indeed very simple and a great addition to the menu to enhance the nutrition for the whole family.
Health Benefits of Chicken Vermicelli Soup
Vermicelli is a familiar dish to Vietnamese people, with a variety of preparations such as vermicelli soup, mixed vermicelli, stir-fried vermicelli, and soups. Unlike instant noodles, which go through repeated frying processes and contain harmful preservatives, vermicelli is naturally dried, ensuring its nutrients and maintaining the chewiness and deliciousness of the dish.
People on a diet often worry about whether eating vermicelli will lead to weight gain. In fact, a regular bowl of chicken vermicelli soup provides about 400 calories. The average calorie intake per meal is around 360 calories. Therefore, after eating vermicelli, you should combine it with exercise or eat fewer other nutrient-dense foods to control your weight.
Additionally, eating chicken vermicelli soup provides protein, fat, glucid, and many other minerals such as iron, calcium, potassium, phosphorus, sodium, and vitamins C, A, and Beta-Carotene. It is evident that chicken vermicelli soup is very good for human health, from children to adults.
One important thing to note is that chicken vermicelli soup is very safe for pregnant women. Vermicelli made from rice, sweet potatoes, mung beans, or canna roots is quite safe and gentle. Eating vermicelli during pregnancy helps to add more nutrition for both the mother and the baby. However, you should not eat too much or continuously consume vermicelli for many days to avoid stomach discomfort, as this dish has relatively low starch and calorie content.
Patients with diabetes can still safely eat chicken vermicelli soup, but it is recommended to use canna vermicelli instead of rice vermicelli. This is because canna vermicelli contains less starch and no cholesterol, which helps control blood sugar levels effectively, aiding in the treatment of diabetes.
Eating chicken vermicelli soup has also been proven to be very beneficial for the digestive system. Vermicelli, with its low fat content, high fiber, low calories, and cooling properties, can neutralize stomach acid, making it beneficial for patients with stomach-related diseases, digestive issues, constipation, diarrhea, and preventing acid reflux.
I hope these insights have helped you learn how to prepare chicken vermicelli soup in a way that suits Vietnamese tastes. Any expatriate who remembers this dish can’t help but feel nostalgic. This weekend, quickly get into the kitchen and cook chicken vermicelli soup using this super simple recipe!
