Feb 09 2010
Asparagus Crab Soup – Also Known As Vietnamese Sup Mang Cua
A couple of months ago, I asked my friends at Ravenous Couple to teach me how to make Asparagus Crab Soup, and they graciously invited us over to their house for a personal cooking lesson! It was lot of fun and I can’t believe how easy and simple it is to make! All this time I thought it took hours to prepare, but really, it’s much faster and easier than you’d think (that is, if you use already prepared crab meat and broth. Good luck extracting fresh crab meat from several crabs!).
Asparagus Crab Soup is most well known at Chinese-Vietnamese restaurants and mainly served at wedding banquets. It’s a wonderful soup consisting of chicken or pork broth, crab meat, white asparagus, eggs, and whole quail eggs. The consistency of this soup is usually thick, which is why we use a lot of corn starch.
Kim & Hong from Ravenous Couple whips up amazing Vietnamese dishes from family recipes. My goal is to try to cook more traditional Vietnamese meals to broaden my versatility in the kitchen – especially since it’s food I grew up eating! Thanks for teaching me how to make this – I have already made it twice!
Here is the link to their blog post and recipe that I used: Sup Mang Cua Vietnamese Asparagus Crab Soup
The essential canned items I used to make this a pain-free experience are: whole peeled white asparagus, king crab meat, and cooked quail eggs. (This picture is so crooked, haha)
In a large pot, bring 12 cups of chicken stock or pork broth to a boil. Then combine the white asparagus (cut into 2-inch pieces), crab meat, and quail eggs to the soup.
In a separate bowl, lightly beat 2 eggs and slowly add it to the soup while on low heat. Swirl it around until you see the egg solidify - it will be just like egg drop soup.
To get the thick consistency, dissolve 3 tbsp of cornstarch in 1 cup of warm water in a bowl and slowly add it a little bit at a time and continue swirling. This will eventually thicken the soup. Depending on how thick you like it, keep adding more corn starch. Finally, season with 2 tbsp of fish sauce, 1 tsp salt, and a pinch of sugar. Taste and add more until desired.
To complete this bowl of soup, sprinkle some ground white pepper, green onion, and cilantro. Then, simply enjoy.
That sounds like a fun cooking evening and what a delicious looking soup! Kim and Hong’s recipes are always so inspiring and enticing.
This looks amazing, and I’ve been looking for another soup recipe because London LOVES her soup.
Think I’m going to make this tomorrow! Thanks so much for sharing.
having you guys over was a lot of fun we should do it again sometime soon!
I love combination of crab & white asparagus – sounds just fantastic, such a great soup!
Hey Cookin’ Canuck, I totally agree with you! Their recipes and demonstrations are amazing.
Sherill – please let me know how it turned out! I hope London likes it! We’ll have to think of more soups to post for you guys.
RavenousCouple – yes it’s been long overdue. hope to see you guys soon! happy new year btw.
This is the second soup recipe that I am going to make today. I have been trying some so that I can serve different kinds for the whole week.
Thanks for stopping by my blog!
The soup looks great, I’m a HUGE fan of soup!
Never tried this soup before but it sure looks and sounds very delicious
I just found your site today! I learned a few new things….I didn’t know there was a white asparagus you can buy in a can, nor did I know you could buy quail eggs in a can too!
Your soup looks great!
This looks so flavoursome!
Quail eggs in a can?? I had no idea about these! Mind you, I really don’t know much about quail eggs in general except that they come from quails (they do, right?)
haha, that’s so funny that a lot of people didn’t know about white asparagus or that you can get quail eggs in a can! glad to have taught you that! and yes, conor, the quail eggs do come from quails. they are tiny little eggs – super adorable.
I love quail eggs in soups!
I wrote a story about a student cooking class awhile back, and this was one of the dishes they made. Came together so easily, and the end result was sure heaven on a cold day — tasty, satisfying and even a bit elegant.
Man you guys just keep slammin’ me with this good food! I did not know quail eggs come in a can, I wonder what the salt content is? I have to make this!
This looks like a wonderfully savory soup!
I am soooooo bookmarking this! (I would print it out immediately except I’ve unhooked my laptop so that I could surf while watching Project Runway). Thank you for including photos of the products you used – I’ll look for them.
Totally wild, I have never had anything like it!
The soup looks perfect!
Great soup! do you think it’s ok to use fresh quail eggs? I love the soup texture!
Hi Citronetvanille – You can absolutely use fresh quail eggs, which you can boil first and peel off the shell. This is definitely a little bit more work, but the quail eggs would taste a lot better. The recipe from Ravenous Couple does use fresh quail eggs. Hope you get a chance to make this soup!
This is one of my youngest son favorite soups. Sometimes I use fresh aspagus for this soup too.
What a gorgeous asparagus recipe to celebrate spring’s arrival. Just want to let you know about an asparagus recipe contest that’s super simple to enter and offers gourmet prizes. Hope you’ll join us at Beet ‘n Squash YOU!
Love, Mel
I love soup ,that looks great,I have never had anything like it!
Even though I’m not a fan of asparagus… I’d give this a shot
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