Medanese Style Chicken soup with coconut milk (Soto Ayam Medan)

Ingredients (serve 6):
2 lbs chicken breast
1 bay leaf
1 tbsp ground lemon grass or 1 lemon grass
5 lime leaves
1/2″ galangal
1 cup coconut milk
3 hard boiled eggs
6 cups bean sprout -> boil quickly before serving
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp salt -> 1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp sweet soy sauce

Spices:
8 shallots
3 cloves garlic
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 tbsp ground coriander seed
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2″ ginger
3 nutmeg

Garnish:
1 green onion
fried shallots




Directions:

1. Put chicken and 4 cups of water in sauce pan and turn the heat to high. When the water boils, turn the heat to low, and put in bay leaf, lime leaves and galangal. Simmer for another 8 – 10 mins, put the chicken aside and leave the chicken broth on low heat.
2. Put all the spices in a blender, and ground them. Spray oil on frying pan and stir fry the ground spices for 1-2 minutes. Put the ground spices and salt and sweet soy sauce in the chicken broth and mix well.
3. Put the coconut milk into the chicken broth mix and stir every 10 minutes or so under low heat. Stirring under low heat is important, because otherwise the coconut milk won’t mix well. Keep doing this for 1 hour.
3. Cut chicken into bite sizes, and mix well with soy sauce, then stir fry for 3-4 minutes.
4. On a bowl, put half hard boiled eggs, bean sprout and chicken. Garnish with green onion and fried shallots. Pour 1/6th of the broth mix on top of it. Enjoy!