Ingredients 30 g Birds nest 1 litre Chicken stock 1 thumb Ginger 1 tbsp Vegetable oil. Instructions Soak the nest for 24 hours in water until it has expanded and softened. Remove and chop the nest into portions.
Add the portions to a pot of water with the chicken stock, oil and ginger and brew for minutes over heat until the nests have dissolved. Add sugar and salt in the pot, and cook for another thirty seconds. Thicken with cornstarch and stir for 1 minute. Adjust stock levels to taste, and add any required seasoning. This soup has been a part of Chinese cuisine for generations. The main ingredient is the nest of the swiftlet bird which is usually found in Southeast Asia.
Edible bird's nests are among the most expensive animal products consumed by humans. The swiftlet lives in dark caves. Instead of twigs and straw, however, the swiftlet makes its nest from strands of its gummy saliva, which is produced by the glands under the tongue.
The nest then hardens when exposed to air. Most nests are built during the breeding season by the male swiftlet for 35 days and they take the shape of a shallow cup stuck to the cave wall. Some people prefer to cook it without rock sugar and instead mix it with some warm milk. The cooking process is extremely critical when making soup. Microwave cooking or boiling on a stove causes the nest to lose any taste it has and it is stripped of its nutritional value. Some of them are as follows:.
It is rich in epidermal growth factor EGF. This substance is responsible for skin and tissue repair. It is traditionally used to clear phlegm, ease chronic dry coughs and relieve fatigue. A weekly guide to the biggest developments in health, medicine and wellbeing delivered to your inbox. Thank you for subscribing! Your subscription is confirmed for news related to biggest developments in health, medicine and wellbeing.
Back to Top. Many bird's nest brands are also certified halal, and so can be marketed to the Muslim populations in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore. Compared to some other traditional Chinese medicines such as rhino horn or shark's fin, the bird's nest is "relatively ethical," said Chiam, given that birds do not need to be killed when their nests are harvested. When asked if it harms the bird that their nests are taken away, Mranata said swiftlets leave the building in the daytime to hunt for food.
It is at this time that swiftlet farmers enter the building to measure, identify, and remove the mature nests. There are no babies in the nest. When a swiftlet returns, "at first they might panic," he said.
They are protected by the farm. Still, there are accounts of birds being harmed or dying in the process. Environmentalist and attorney Jagath Gunawardana said in the Sunday Observer that swiftlet farmers do not wait until a chick vacates a nest before harvesting them.
Rather, because the farmers prefer for nests to be as fresh as possible, they sometimes collect the nests and throw any eggs and chicks onto the floor. Because swiftlets cannot perch on the ground, these chicks get eaten alive by armies of ants that are attracted to the chicks and broken eggs.
In Sarawak, Malaysia's largest state, there have been reports of nest theft depleting an entire swiftlet population of about four million birds in Niah National Park. And in China, a nation-wide check was conducted on all edible bird's nests on the market after tests by the Zhejiang Administration for Industry and Commerce found more than 30, cups of red bird's nest to contain up to times the acceptable nitrate levels according to China's health standards.
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