Pork Rib soup with sweetcorn and chestnuts

My grandma was born in Quin Dynasty and grew up in a small village in the mainland China.  She was a very traditional Chinese woman and liked doing everything by her. When she firstly came to Hong Kong, she was about 60 years old. She lived in a cottage with a farm in front of the house in the New Territories with my great grandparents. She raised chickens and planted vegetables. She loved cooking very much, especially traditional Chinese dishes.  When I was young, she always visited us on Sundays.  Every time she must make soup for my family.  She believed that soup was good for health.  Here is one of her delicious soup recipes.

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 2 hours and 15 minutes

Serve: 3

Ingredients:

-         2 sweet corns

-      400g pork spare rib           

-         12 chestnuts (unpeeled)

-         1 slice of ginger (about 8g)

-         2  golden thread preserved dates

-         2L water

-         2 tbsp salt

Method:

1.	Trim away the fat of the pork rib, clean and cut it into two big pieces.
2.	Parboiling: Pour 1L water in a pot and add the pork rib.  Simmer them over a low heat for 20 minutes. Remove from heat.  Rinse if necessary and drain well.  Set aside.
3.	Boil 2L water in a big pot over medium heat.
4.	Add ginger, chestnuts, preserved dates and sweet corns in the pot and boil for 10 minutes.  Then add the pork ribs and reduce to low heat.  Cover and simmer for 2 hours 15 minutes.
5.	Sautee with salt and ready to serve.

	Tips:
i.	I have two big pots for boiling Chinese soup.  One is a traditional soup pot and another one is thermal pot.  My mom likes using a slow cooker because it is easy to use it..
ii.	I love soup with strong flavor so I use 2L water to boil the soup.  If you like a clearer and light flavor soup, you adjust the amount of water according to your preference.
iii.	Do not add salt at the beginning stage.  It should be added when the soup is about ready to be served.
iv.	One important preparation step to boil Chinese or simmer soup is parboiling the ingredients before adding them into the soup.  To parboil means to cook the ingredients partially. For meat or bone ingredients, parboiling can get rid of blood and some of the fat. In the parboiling process, there are froths and bits floating on the surface.  Parboiling can make the soup clearer.