Love egg drop soup? For the second video in the new Appetite for China Cooking Videos series, I decided to update this post with a fun visual guide on making egg drop soup with tomatoes. Let me know what you think!
I first made tomato egg drop soup in 2008 while living in Beijing during the Summer Olympics. At the time, I was in desperate need of something light and healthy for lunch to go with a salad, to counteract all the fried food I had been eating at the Olympic venues. And what could be more healthy and comforting at the same time than tomatoes and eggs in homemade chicken broth? Over the years I’ve tweaked the recipe bit by bit and come up with this revised version.
There are few ingredients in this soup, so it’s important that the chicken stock (or vegetable stock) be homemade. (You can use either Chinese or Western homemade stock.) If you must use store-bought, try to find organic stock or broth that does not have too many preservatives in the label.
This soup is incredibly simple to prepare, with no special technique other than the swirling in of the egg whites to create the egg strands. It may sound intimidating, but rest assured you’ll get a hang of it easily! (Just read the recipe over and familiarize yourself with Step 2 before beginning cooking.) You may soon be making egg drop soup like a pro!
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Tomato Egg Drop Soup
Serves 4
- 4 to 5 cups chicken or vegetable stock
- 2 teaspoons grated ginger
- 1 tablespoon soy sauce or tamari
- 1 teaspoon sesame oil
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon ground white pepper
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 medium firm tomatoes, cut into wedges
- 1 large egg
- 1 scallion, chopped or thinly sliced for garnish
- In a medium pot, bring the stock to boil. Stir in the ginger, soy sauce, sesame oil, sugar, white pepper, and salt. Add tomatoes and cook for just another 2 to 3 minutes. Adjust the seasoning with more salt and pepper if desired.
- In a small bowl, whisk the egg lightly with a fork. Slowly pour the egg into the soup in a steady stream while continuously stirring with a long spoon or chopstick. The egg should cook immediately and look like long yellowish-white strands. Turn off the heat right after to prevent the eggs from overcooking.
- Ladle the soup into individual bowls, sprinkle the scallions on top, and serve.
mm that looks delicious and so easy to make :)
buuut how much egg white do you use? just 1 egg’s worth?
lauren – 1 egg white is enough for 4 servings and the amount of stock in the recipe. If you increase the amount of stock, you can add 1/2 or 1 more egg white.
I lived in China 2002-2003 and ate this soup at least once a week, but never found a recipe for it (which killed me b/c I knew it had to be simple). Thank you!
my mom made this in the summer when i was a kid in the ’50′s…never thought of it as Chinese… just assumed it was part of that weird chinese-american food experience. its very much like the canned Del Monte cream corn with chicken stock egg drop soup…funny thing, found the same version of this soup in vietnam a few months ago.
How long do you stir for?
I love egg drop soup… yours looks so good and tempting. I have an Italian version on this… with Parmigiano cheese of course.
Ciao.
What a comforting looking soup! I love egg drop soup and adding tomatoes will be bring a great flavor. Thanks for the redcipe.
Great video! Hope you continue to make more!
I love egg drop soup but could never figure out how they made the nice long strands. Now it looks so easy in the video I’m so tempted to try this tomorrow.
Do you shoot all of these all by yourself? That is super impressive, lady! We should collaborate some time! :)
Yum. Now egg drop soup doesn’t seem so hard to make!
I’ve just moved to Shanghai and came across your website and have been madly pinning loads of your recipes! Will definitely be making this soup once we move into our apartment you’ve made it look so simple.