Recipe - Chicken Velvet And Lettuce Soup

1 Chicken breast
One half cup Stock (see recipe)
1 Egg white
2 cup Lettuce
2 tablespoon Smoked ham
6 cup Stock
1 teaspoon Salt
One half teaspoon Sugar

1. Skin and bone chicken breast; pound meat with mallet or side of
cleaver, then mince fine, removing tendons. Blend in stock.

2. Beat egg white until fluffy but not stiff. Fold into chicken mixture.
Cut lettuce in strips. Mince ham.

3. Bring remaining stock to a boil. Add lettuce, salt and sugar. Bring
to a boil again; remove at once from heat.

4. Stir in chicken mixture. Garnish with minced ham. Serve at once.

VARIATIONS: For the chicken, substitute One fourth pound pork or ham, 4 water
chestnuts and 4 dried black mushrooms (soaked), all slivered. Combine with
stock, but omit egg white in step 2. Add this mixture in step 3 before
lettuce and seasonings. Simmer, covered, 10 minutes. Add lettuce and
simmer, uncovered, 2 minutes more. Season with the salt, dash of pepper,
and 1 teaspoon soy sauce, omitting the sugar.

For the lettuce, substitute One half pound mustard cabbage, shredded. Then
poach a Chinese salt egg and float on the soup as a garnish.

From The Thousand Recipe Chinese Cookbook, ISBN 0517658704. Downloaded
from Glen's MM Recipe Archive, http://www.erols.com/hosey.