Fresh Cereus Flower Soup (xian ba wang hua tang)

Why people make this soup

Nourilo once thought the cereus and the epiphyllum were the same flower, then learned they’re cousins in the cactus family — and that dragon fruit is in fact the fruit of this cereus (ba wang hua). The fresh flower is more cooling and mucilaginous than the dried, but its scent is lovely. Simmered with carrot, honey date and pork, it’s a fragrant, comforting bowl for those carrying stomach-intestinal heat — dry stools, a bloated, uncomfortable stomach, bad breath, a flushed face, a dry sore throat.

Method

1. Rinse the fresh flowers and cut them open. Peel and slice the carrot. Slice the pork and blanch it.
2. Put everything in a pot with 1.8 L of water and simmer about 2 hours down to about 1.2 L. Drink the soup and eat the ingredients.

Nourilo’s Tips

This soup is also good for children with phlegm-heat lumps, or for a lung-heat phlegmy cough. If you find the fresh flower too cooling, add ginger and aged tangerine peel to take the edge off.