Banjar Clear Soup (Soto Banjar)

Soup
1 whole chicken. cut into 4 pieces
1,5 litres water
1/2 teaspoon white pepper
4 spring onion, chopped
2 chinese celery, chopped
10 shallots
5 cloves garlic
1/2 whole nutmeg
5 cm cinnamon stick
4 cloves
2 pods cardamon
2 tablespoons cooking oil

Condiments
100 gr mungbean noodles, blanch with boiling water for 2 minutes
3 hard boiled eggs, cut into wedges
50 gr beansprouts, blanch with boiling water for 1 minute
deep fried shallot flakes
frikadel potatoes (recipe here)
sweet soy sauce
2 limes, cut into wedges

Chili paste
5 red chili
10 thai eye’s chili
5 candlenut,
1 teaspoon shrimp paste
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon cooking oil

Wrap nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves and cardamon with a piece of cloth (preferably some type of muslin). Set aside.
Grind shallots and garlic into fine paste. Heat 2 tablespoons cooking oil over high heat for 2 minutes. Toss in the spices in muslin.
In a big stock pot, add the water and the spices from above, cover and cook over low heat for 10 minutes.
Add pieces of chicken into the pot. Cook for another 20 minutes.
Remove chicken pieces. Shred the meat and get rid off the bones.
Set aside.

To prepare the chili paste, put all the ingredients in a spice grinder and grind them into paste.

To serve, ladle the soup into individual serving bowls. Add mungbean noodles, beansprouts, shredded chicken, bitter-nut crackers, perkedel potatoes and hard boiled egg wedges.
Sprinkle some shallot flakes and a couple of dash of soy sauce with squirts of lime juice before serving.

Add chili paste moderately and mix everything up.
Serve with warm rice