Tom Ka Vegetable Soup

(serves 4 to 6)

Adapted from 40 aprons 

We have been having a lot of soup lately; being the middle of a cold winter, an easy way to go vegetarian and have a meal ready for a couple of days. I was reminded of this delicious tom ka soup when mum showed up with a lot of mushrooms the other day. This traditional Thai soup (= tom) is an aromatic (distinctly from the galangal = ka), coconut milk based delicious soup that usually isn't spicy (despite a lot of recipes I saw using plenty of chilli but I guess Thai people generally love chilli). 

I remember the first time I tried this in Thailand and it was amazing and definitely a comfort food! Always prefer this over tom yum now. Usually it's served with chicken but that's actually my least favourite part, so it wasn't hard to go vegetarian for this meal. It's traditionally served as a soup, but treated like a curry as you can eat it with rice, but we also enjoyed it is a rice noodle soup. 

Prep time: 30 minutes

Cooking time: 30-40 minutes

Ingredients
1 Tbsp oil
1 brown onion
2 cloves garlic
1 lemongrass stalk
1x5cm length piece of galangal
2 tsp red curry paste
4 cups (1 Litre) vegetable stock
6-10 kaffir lime leaves
4 cups (1 Litre) coconut milk
4 cups chopped vegetables (e.g. broccoli, zucchini, carrot, Chinese cabbage, cauliflower, potatoes)
350 g mushrooms (can do a mixture of white, brown, oyster)
1-2 Tbsp (10-15 g) palm sugar
2-3 Tbsp fish sauce
1-2 Tbsp (approximately 1/2 lime) lime juice
2 stems of green shallots, to garnish
handful of Thai basil leaves, to garnish
dried onion flakes, to garnish

To serve;
rice or 1kg thin rice noodles

Method
1. Prepare the aromatics by roughly chopping the onion and garlic. Remove the outer layer of the lemongrass then diagonally slice it. Wash and slice the galangal into 3mm thick sections.

2. In a large pot, heat up the oil on low heat, then add in the onion, garlic, lemongrass and galangal. Stir gently for a few minutes then add in the red curry paste, then after a minute add in the vegetable stock. Tear the kaffir lime leaves as you place them in then simmer for 10 minutes before adding in the coconut milk. Cook for another 10 minutes until just starting to bubble.
3. Meanwhile, prepare the vegetables by chopping into bite-sized pieces and the garnishing ingredients (wash the basil, cut the shallots) and set aside.

4. Place the vegetables (other than the mushrooms) into the soup to cook, this may take 5-10 minutes. Drain the aromatics and the vegetables through a sieve into a large bowl. Return the soup to the pot. Remove the aromatics and set aside the cooked vegetables. 

5. Taste test the soup now, adding the fish sauce and sugar. When the taste is about right, then add in the mushrooms and cook for 5 minutes or until soft. Remove from the heat and add in the lime juice to taste.
6. If serving with rice noodles, remove from the packet and soak for a couple of minutes in hot water then drain. Separate into the serving bowls, add in the cooked vegetables then pour the soup on top. Garnish with shallots, basil and fried onion.
If serving with rice, then combine the previously cooked vegetables back into the soup pot and stir through. Garnish with shallots, basil and fried onion and serve hot.