Egg Flower Soup
Ready in 10-15 minutes, this soup is the fastest bowl of comfort you'll ever make.
Cooking Summary
Ingredients: (detailed list)
- Soup Base: egg, water, cornstarch
- Additional Ingredients: pea, corn, carrot, green onion
- Flavor: salt, chicken bouillon, white pepper, sesame oil
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Top 3 Mistakes
- Using flour for the slurry:
Use the starch thickener described in the recipe rather than ordinary flour. Flour makes the broth more opaque, changing the clear appearance that the egg flower soup is meant to have.
- Using too much heat on eggs:
Follow the recipe’s heat changes instead of leaving the burner high throughout. Eggs cook quickly, and controlling the heat helps preserve the soft texture rather than drying them out.
- Adding thickener too fast:
Add the starch mixture gradually while stirring, checking the texture as it thickens. Pouring it all in at once gives you less control over the final consistency of the sauce.
Overview
Egg Drop Soup (also known as "Egg Flower Soup") was a crowd favorite at my parents' old restaurant.
As kids, my sister and I used to eat this 3 to 4 times a week. It's incredibly easy to make, and healthy too!
Read on to learn how to make this for you and your loved ones.
Ingredients
Why this recipe
Most egg flower soup recipes online are tested only a handful of times. My dad used to make this dish multiple times a day, every day, for 60+ years and can make this in his sleep.
I know you'll love it as much as our community does! This recipe has over 940.7K views, 26.5K likes on YouTube.
Make it your own
For this recipe, my dad chose to use carrots, corn, and peas, but you can really use anything you'd like for the additional ingredients.
My dad's philosophy on cooking is to get creative and try different things.
Feel free to try this with minced meats, shrimp, other vegetables - I've even seen other chefs use tomato in their soup base.
On Special Flavors
My dad usually has chicken powder on hand in his kitchen. Since some grocery stores don't carry this, I've included a link to purchase the one my dad uses on Amazon.
Sesame oil is another ingredient that's sometimes hard to find in Western grocery stores. Here's our favorite on Amazon!
These links are affiliate links, which means that if you use our links to purchase these ingredients, Amazon pays my family a small amount for the sale - at no extra cost to you. If you use these links, we really appreciate the support!
How to make Egg Flower Soup
Cut green onion, carrots
First, chop up some green onion (2 stalk) and carrots (2 oz). For the carrots, my dad prefers to chop them into little cubes.
Boil water
Add water (6 cup) to your pot, and set the stove to high heat to bring the pot to a boil. Cover the pot with a lid.
Prepare eggs
Now we build the foundation of our Egg Flower Soup.
Crack eggs into a bowl, and add a small amount of water (1 tbsp). Then, mix with a fork or chopsticks for about 20 seconds.
Pro-tip:
The water helps the eggs "flower" more easily and beautifully.
Add carrots, corn, peas
Once our pot is boiling, add carrots (2 oz), corn (2 oz), and peas (2 oz). Cover the pot again.
Prepare cornstarch slurry
Cornstarch is a common ingredient in Chinese cuisine, used to thicken sauces and soups among many other purposes.
Add cornstarch (3 tbsp) and water (5 tbsp) to a bowl, and mix until there are no clumps left.
Slowly pour & mix cornstarch
Over the course of about 30 seconds, gradually pour the cornstarch slurry into the soup, stirring the soup constantly as we pour.
Slowly pour & mix eggs
Similar to the previous step, gradually pour in the eggs into the pot, constantly stirring as you go. Do this for about 20 seconds.
The slower you pour, the more wispy "flowers" you'll get. DO NOT pour the eggs all at once.
(For each recipe and YouTube episode, I film my dad cooking each recipe twice. For the first take, he spent about 20 seconds on this step. For the second take - 18 seconds.)
Add flavors
Almost done! Turn the heat off to preserve the softness of the eggs and avoid overcooking the soup.
Next, add salt (1 tsp) and chicken bouillon (1 tsp), as well as white pepper and sesame oil to your liking. Stir the flavors around for a few seconds.
Plate the soup
Call your loved ones over - dinner is ready!
Pour the soup into a bowl(s) of your choosing, and garnish with the green onion (2 stalk) we chopped earlier.
Pairs well with
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Made with love ❤️
We started Made With Lau to celebrate Cantonese culture and honor the legacy of our wonderful parents, Jenny and Chung Sun Lau.
Our hope is that these recipes and stories help you spread the joy, love, and nostalgia that I felt growing up.
