A Chinese origin soup which contains wolfberry, it is a fruit of Lycium barbarum (Lycos = wolf in Greek, Barbarum = somewhere else) or Matrimony vine from Ningxia where the majority of "Goji berries" are harvested and produced there. It has many other names such as wolfberry, boxthorn, Himalayan/Tibetan Goji (Gojibeeren/Bocksdorn = Thorn of goat or Getrocknete Bocksdorn-Beeren in German, Baies de goji séchées in French, gugija in Korea).
The plant is actually called "Gouqi" in Chinese and means " High class or Superior " which suggested that the plants are grown in the high mountains where the best climate and the rich mineral water make them to be "Superior" (quality).
"Gouqi" is one of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) or "Kampo" in Japan which is known to use plants and animal elements (dried organs,teeth, bones of animals in the forest and the ocean), so called pseudomedicine which claims to cure cancer and others, including raise the potence for men. It is based the "Yin-Yang" theory combining with acupuncture and other practitions.
Our Chinese herbal soup is actually a chicken stew with goji berries. There are no bones of tiger or dried sea horses, except chicken legs.
There is other well-known spice, so called "Five Spices" which usually contains
- Star anise (bajiao, 八角) or anise seeds
- Cloves (dingxiang, 丁香) or mandarin orange peels or galangal or ginger roots
- Chinese Cinnamon (rougui, 肉桂)
- Sichuan pepper (huajiao, 花椒)
- Fennel seeds (xiaohuixiang, 小茴香)
Other variations may contain nutmeg, turmeric and so on. The formular of Chinese medicine comes in odd numbers starting from 5, 7,9, 11,... and A, B, C depends on your purposes (to cure or to raise potence) and locations. The number represents how many of elements are in that formula. It could be a mix of plants and animal parts that sometimes are not allowed to hunt them :((
As the color is red, it can be used as a food decoration as well as a spice in your delicious herbal soup.
To your health! and Happy Chinese Soup!
