Codonopsis, Cordyceps Flower & Quail Soup

Why people make this soup

When the weather swings unpredictably between warm and cold — prime conditions for seasonal flu to spread — Nourilo turns to this nourishing soup as a gentle preventive measure for those with weaker constitutions. Wild cordyceps (dong chong xia cao) is one of the most celebrated tonic ingredients in Chinese medicine, but its price has climbed sky-high in recent years. Fortunately, cultivated cordyceps flower (chong cao hua, also called jin chong cao) offers a practical alternative — it is the fruiting body grown from the same fungus species, widely available in Chinese herbal shops and Asian grocery stores, and sold at a fraction of the cost. Combined with codonopsis (a gentler substitute for ginseng), goji berries, red dates, and small but protein-rich quail, this soup is traditionally understood to tonify the five organs, nourish qi and blood, and help the body stay resilient when illness is going around.