Cantonese ABC Soup

Warm up with a comforting bowl of traditional Cantonese ABC soup with our quick and easy Instant Pot’s clear broth technique. In mere moments, you can enjoy tender chicken legs, hearty potatoes, sweet tomatoes, succulent corn on the cob, all immersed in a soul-nourishing, spleen-qi-loving clear broth.

Perfect lunch or dinner for those busy back to school days, cold days or days you are feeling a bit under the weather.

Jump to:

• Clear Broth in an Instant
• Soup Benefits
• What does ABC Soup Stand For?
• Easy to Find Ingredients
• How to Make Cantonese Soup in the Instant Pot
• The Instant Pot Advantage
• Crafting the Clear Broth
• Recipe Tips
• Equipment
• How to serve
• Accompaniments
• Vegan Option
• Storage and Reheating
• Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s)
• More Savory Chinese Soups
• Cantonese ABC Soup (Instant Pot Clear Broth Recipe)

Clear Broth in an Instant

Wave farewell to the hours spent waiting for Chinese soups to simmer on the stovetop, blanching chicken, and skimming the surface. The Instant Pot (or electric multi cooker) does all the work, so you don’t have to.

Using the Instant Pot soup setting allows the liquid to come to a slow simmer without boiling - the result is a clear soup. In addition, we have loads of other helpful hacks to help you achieve a clear soup that even grandma would be proud of.

Soup Benefits

Grandmas always know best! This time-honored ABC Soup recipe has been around for centuries boosting immunity during cold and flu seasons or whenever you need some extra tender loving care. Revitalize your health and bolster your immunity with nourishing chicken soup. It’s a bowl of prevention and wellness in every spoonful.

This chicken soup is cooked with bones, so it contains extra vitamins and collagen. ABC Soup is not cooked as long as our beef bone broth.  However, the added pressure from the Instant Pot helps extract the nutrients and flavor.

With just 6 main staple ingredients, you can enjoy a delicious homemade Cantonese soup, in under an hour. Try adding fun alphabet noodles or rice to the soup for an extra hearty meal.

What does ABC Soup Stand For?

Healthy ABC soup contains vitamins A, B and C from the nourishing carrots, potatoes, and tomatoes. One may argue that it is called ABC soup because it is an essential recipe that everyone should learn how to make – and it’s easy like ABC.

Did ABC soup originate in Malaysia, China or elsewhere?  Does it even matter? All we know, is that you are going to love having this simple Asian soup on your menu rotation.

Easy to Find Ingredients

Chicken drumstick (legs) – are budget friendly. You can also substitute with other chicken parts with bones such as thighs, wings, etc. In addition, you can also substitute with pork ribs. If you use pork, you may consider adding in a little Shaoxing wine or cooking sherry to mellow out the flavor in the soup.

Potatoes – We used a waxy Yukon gold potato because we love that creamy buttery flavor. Because they are less starchy, they hold up well in soups and retain their shape. Red potatoes and new potatoes are also waxy potatoes that do not turn into mash while the soup simmers. If you prefer rice instead of potatoes, you may like to try our immunity boosting soup.

Carrots – Pick the thicker carrots. We prefer to cut larger the carrots larger to prevent them from breaking down during the cooking process. They add sweetness to this Chinese soup.

Tomatoes – Plum or Roma tomatoes are budget friendly, have less seeds and are meatier compared to other types of tomatoes. However, use the type of fresh tomatoes you have on hand or canned tomatoes. The acid from the tomatoes helps extract more collagen and cartilage from the bones.  This makes this Chinese soup more delicious and nutritious. 

Corn – Fresh on the cob is preferred during the peak season.  Our Tri-colored farmers market sweet corn added a delicate sweetness to the ABC soup broth.  Of course, you can substitute with either frozen or canned corn as well.

Onion – but of course, right! As shocking as this may seem, there is NO garlic in this recipe. A few sliced green onions add a pop of freshness to the dish.

Ginger – This fresh spice is optional but really makes this recipe super cozy, zippy and warming.  Of course, you can also try a little dried ground ginger instead of fresh. We add about 2.5-inch knob ginger bashed and add directly into the soup.

Optional Chinese Red Dates and Goji Berries – to nourish your spleen and blood.

How to Make Cantonese Soup in the Instant Pot

• Peel Tomatoes – First make a small slit in the tomato skin in both directions. Then, pour boiling water to cover the tomatoes for just about 1 to 2 minutes. Immediately, plunge the poached tomatoes into a bath of iced water. Then, peel the tomatoes and slice them into large chunks.

• Prep Vegetables - Peel and chop potatoes, carrots, onions, and slice into large chunks. Remove the husk from the corn on the cob. Use a knife to carefully cut into sections or just break it in half with your hands.

• Aromatics – Cut approximately a 2.0-inch (5.0 cm) piece of fresh ginger in half and bash with a knife. Rinse Chinese red dates and goji berries if you plan on using them – optional ingredient.
• Remove skin from chicken- If using a chicken drumstick, just start peeling from the large end down to the small end and pull off the skin and fat.

• Place all the ingredients in the Instant Pot and cover with water. Seal the Instant Pot and make sure the nozzle is in the sealed position. Set the Instant Pot to the soup setting for 35 minutes on high pressure. Allow the pressure cooker to natural release for at least 15 to 20 minutes or until the plunger is released. Season to taste.
• Serve ABC Soup – Place the cooked chicken, potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, onion, and corn on the cob in a bowl and ladle over several scoops of the nourishing clear chicken broth. Garnish with sliced green onions and enjoy.

The Instant Pot Advantage

Unlike a standard pressure cooker, the Instant Pot or electric multi cooker, has many other preset programs. These special settings are very convenient when cooking black rice or even a lentil ham stew because they simply the cooking process and you have better results.  

One of the primary benefits of owning a multi cooker lies in its soup setting. Unlike the pressure cook option, the soup setting facilitates a gradual and gentle simmer for the broth under pressure. With this function, there's no aggressive boiling involved. This is crucial because boiling soup can lead to undesirable outcomes such as cloudiness and the risk of vegetables turning mushy.

Of course, a cloudy soup with impurities and mushy veggies is not very appetizing! If you want a clear broth while cooking on the stovetop, you must first skim off the impurities and that takes time. This soup function on the Instant Pot keeps soups clear of impurities and/or at least allows the few to be easily scooped away from the top.

Crafting the Clear Broth

If your grandma showed you how to make authentic Chinese ABC soup, you were probably taught that you needed to blanch the chicken, not once but twice, before adding to the soup pot. With our fool proof method, you can skip this time-consuming step altogether.

1. Use the Soup function on the Instant Pot or electric multi-cooker with a normal pressure.
2. Use Chicken legs (drumsticks) because the skin is so easy to remove. In addition, there is no need to pre-blanch chicken legs before adding to the Instant Pot. (However, if you decide to use a fatty difficult to skin protein like chicken feet, etc. – These will need to be blanched before placing them in the Instant Pot)
3. When adding optional Chinese red dates to the soup, keep them whole. Remove them carefully before serving the soup. If they break open, they can cloud the soup broth. If they do break open, no worries. For the home cook, this is just fine because it makes the soup extra nourishing.
4. If you choose to cook Cantonese ABC soup on the stove top, do not boil broth. Instead, allow gradual heating to a simmer so that the proteins have a chance to gather. This makes it easier to skim foam off the top.

Recipe Tips

• Cut the vegetables into large chunks so that they do not break apart when cooking. The star of today's recipe is delicious sweet fresh picked sweet corn on the cob.
• Peeled vegetables and tomatoes are more pleasing from a texture standpoint.
• Remove as much fat and skin from the chicken as possible to keep the clearest broth. This is also more pleasing from a serving perspective.
• Season abc soup to taste with salt and pepper and adjust before serving. We usually do not add too much salt at the beginning because the flavors have not yet developed fully. If you are trying to watch your sodium intake, you can try using a salt free seasoning. 
• It can take up to 30 minutes for the Instant Pot to come to pressure before starting to cook on the soup setting.
• If you have the time, you can allow the Instant Pot multi cooker to naturally release. We chose to allow 15 minutes of natural release, followed by a quick release.
• Please be careful and use a towel when using the quick release method. The Instant Pot is quite full, and some juice and steam will be released.
• Do not overfill the multi-cooker! There is a line labeled on the inside pot that you should never go above.

Equipment

We used a 6.0 quart (5.6 liter) Instant Pot Duo series. It took approximately 6 cups of cool water to cover the ingredients. If you own a smaller multi-cooker, you can cut the ingredients in half and just cook less.

How to serve

Kid Friendly - We usually remove the chicken from the bone and shred or cut it into bite-sized pieces. This makes it easier for them to enjoy the soup without the hassle of bones.

Adults - We add tender chicken drumsticks and veggies with several ladles of nourishing broth into a soup bowl. Then, top it off with a few sliced green onions.

Accompaniments

• Consider incorporating cooked alphabet pasta or rice for a fun and filling meal idea. Encouraging the kids to spell out words using the alphabet pasta.
• Serve with crackers, whole wheat focaccia bread or gluten free dinner rolls.
• Sometimes, we like to serve a little soy sauce with garlic chili oil on the side to dip the chicken in.
• Serve a few pan-fried or boiled dumplings on the side.
• You can’t go wrong with a delicious bowl of Hong Kong fried rice or eggplant with garlic sauce on the side.

Vegan Option

If you want to try a plant-based option, swap the chicken with mushrooms. Rehydrated dried shiitake mushrooms and their soaking liquid add a delicious umami flavor to the broth. You will need to reduce the cooking time to 20 minutes using the soup setting.

Storage and Reheating

Cantonese ABC Soup can be stored covered in the refrigerator for up to 3 days or in the freezer for up to 3 months.

Reheat the soup over medium heat in a pot on the stove top or in the microwave until warm.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s)

More Savory Chinese Soups

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