Double-boil (隔水燉, the covered pot sits in a pan of simmering water): put everything in the double-boiling pot and pour in about 1 to 1.5 litres of boiling water to just cover the ingredients, put the lid on and seal it with cling film (traditionally 紗紙, a thin gauze paper), then sit it in a pan of boiling water (the outer water coming one third to halfway up the side of the pot) for 3 hours, topping up with boiling water along the way. Salt goes in last. There is also a 虎乳靈芝 (tiger milk mushroom) version done in an electric double-boiler with 1.5 litres of hot water for 3 hours.
Soak and wash the dried crocodile meat, then blanch it (汆水, a quick boil) to take off the smell; cut the lean pork into pieces and blanch it as well.
Crush the 川貝 (fritillary bulb); soak and rinse the sea coconut, sweet and bitter apricot kernels, dried figs and aged tangerine peel.
Put everything in the double-boiling pot and pour in boiling water to just cover the ingredients.
Put the lid on, seal with cling film and double-boil (隔水燉, the covered pot sits in a pan of simmering water) for 3 hours.
Season with salt before drinking and bring the pot to the table as it is.
Who it suits
long standing cough
a lot of phlegm
a stuffy or reactive nose (鼻敏感)
sensitive airways
a wheezy, short-of-breath constitution (哮喘體質 in the source)
Who should take care
Not suitable for a cough at the onset of a cold from an outside chill (clear the surface first)
Fritillary bulb is not for a cold type cough (thin, clear white phlegm)
Pregnant women should take care
People with protein allergies should be cautious with crocodile meat
Do not take double-boiled tonics while a cold has not fully cleared (applies across this collection)
People with gout should take care, long double-boiled meat soups are high in purines (general warning across this collection)
Soup stories
The most distinctively Hong Kong of the medicinal double-boiled soups. Using crocodile meat to support the lungs and settle a cough is a custom found only in Guangdong and Hong Kong, following the folk logic of using lung to nourish lung. Dried goods shops sell the dried meat, and dessert houses and herbal shops sell it ready-made by the pot.
Lo Fo Tong is cultural food-heritage reference, not medical advice. If you are pregnant, unwell or on medication, talk to your doctor or registered practitioner before changing what is in the pot.
問阿媽ASK AH MA
Lo Fo Tong is cultural food-heritage reference, not medical advice. If you are pregnant, unwell or on medication, talk to your doctor or registered practitioner before changing what is in the pot.