🇵🇭 Philippines
TinolaFilipino chicken ginger soup
A Filipino soup of chicken simmered in a ginger broth with green papaya (or chayote), finished with chili leaves or moringa (malunggay) leaves.
Origin and history
Tinola is one of the best-known everyday soups of the Philippines. In José Rizal's 1887 novel Noli Me Tangere, Kapitan Tiago serves it at his welcome dinner for Ibarra, and the cuts given to each guest carry a social message; the novel describes it as a stew of chicken and squash. GMA News adds that it appears in accounts of the Katipuneros because it needed few tools and ingredients.
Make it at home
- Makes
- 6 servings
- Total time
- 1 h
- Hands-on
- 25 min
Ingredients
- 1.3 kg3 lb chicken, bone-in, cut in serving pieces
- 3 tbsp cooking oil
- 8 cm piece3 inch piece ginger, cut in thin strips; the defining flavour
- 5 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
- 1 onion, chopped
- 2 tbsp fish sauce (patis), plus more to taste
- 1.5 L6 1/4 cups water, rice-rinsing water is traditional (the second rinse)
- 2 small green papaya, peeled, seeded, cut in wedges; or 3 chayotes
- 2 cups chili leaves (dahon ng sili) or malunggay (moringa) leaves, stems removed; or baby spinach
- black pepper, to taste
Method
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1. Heat the oil in a pot and sauté the garlic, onion and ginger over medium heat until the onion turns translucent and the kitchen smells of ginger, about 3 minutes.
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2. Add the chicken and brown it lightly on all sides, about 3 minutes.
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3. Stir in the fish sauce, then pour in the rice water or plain water. Bring to a boil, skimming off any foam.
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4. Lower the heat and simmer about 20 minutes, until the chicken is nearly tender.
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5. Add the papaya wedges and simmer 15 to 20 minutes more, until a knife slides easily into the papaya but it still keeps its shape.
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6. Season with fish sauce and pepper. Turn off the heat, stir in the leaves, cover and let them wilt for 2 minutes.
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7. Serve hot in bowls with rice.
Notes
- Ginger is essential: without it the dish is just boiled chicken. The usual additions are green papaya or chayote and chili leaves or malunggay; spinach is a fair substitute when neither is available.
- Green papaya is hard to find outside Southeast Asian markets; chayote (sayote) is the usual stand-in, gives a crunchier texture and lighter sweetness, while papaya gives a softer texture and a richer, thicker broth. Cooks differ on which they prefer.
- Some cooks use chicken cubes for extra savour; this recipe relies on browning and the ginger instead.
- Rizal's Noli Me Tangere (chapter 3) serves tinola at Kapitan Tiago's dinner, and the novel names the vegetable as squash (calabaza), so the vegetable varied from early on.
- Related: binakol from the Visayas is a similar chicken soup with a coconut-water base, often with lemongrass, and a richer, more layered taste than tinola's clear, ginger-forward style. Make-ahead: reheats well, but add the leaves fresh.
Adapted from Panlasang Pinoy, Chicken tinola, GMA News, In defense of tinola, and Ulam Pinoy, Tinola in Rizal's Noli Me Tangere.
At the festivals
No festival we list has printed it on a menu yet.