Cream of Barley Soup

Ingredients (for 12 paxs):

Soup Base: **
* it's better to make your own soup base. Otherwise, buy the ready made from supermarkets.

Old Chicken x 1 
Gammon Ham bones or chinese ham 
Carrot x 1pc - cut in 2-3 pieces
Celery x 1/2 stalk
Onion x 2 - cut into halves

** For vegetarian version, replace chicken and ham soup base with Vegetable stock or plain water.

Barley Soup:
Potato x 6-8pc - depending on size, cut into chunks
Pearly Barley - approx 250g
carrots x 3-6 pc, depending on size - cut into mini cubes
onion x 1, minced
corn - can use can corns (whole corns, not cream corns)
ham pieces (optional)
whipping cream, salt and pepper

How to Make:
1. The day before your dinner, make the soup base. Blanched chicken and ham or ham bones for 20 minutes. Remove all liquid and rinse the blanched chicken, ham or ham bones.

2. Put blanched chicken, ham or ham bones in a larger soup pot, add carrot, celery, onion and water, bring to boil, then turn to medium to medium fire and cook for 2.5 to 3 hours, depending how rich and concentrated you want your soup base to be.

3. Remove all ingredients from the soup by using a sieve. Then skim off all fat on surface. Once cool down, chill at fridge.

4. On your dinner date, take our soup base and reheat. Then turn off fire.

5. Rinse barley. Then soak them in a bowl of water for 1 -2 hours.

6. Blanch potato until soft. Discard all water. Blend the softened potato with the heated soup base in a few batches. Add more softened potato if the soup consistency is too watery OR add more soup base if too thick.

6. In a new soup pot, add a little of olive oil and stirred fried the minced onion. Once fragrant, add the minced carrot and the soaked barley (discarding the barley water) and corn, then add the blended soup base above, bring to boil, then turn down to medium and medium low heat and cook for 1.5 hours. Watch and stir from time to time to avoid barley sticking to the bottom of the pot and got burned.

As the barley will make the soup thicker, in case it becomes too thick, you might to need to add some plain soup base or chicken stock to adjust the consistency. So ensure you have some plain soup base or chicken stock around, just in case!

Before serving, add some cooked ham pieces to the soup, then some whipping cream.

Enjoy!