Old Cucumber Soup 老黄瓜汤

老黄瓜汤功效:黄瓜性寒，味甘，有清热解毒、利水消肿等功效；白糖性寒，味甘，有润肺生津、和中益肺、舒缓肝气等功效。

黄瓜营养成分 黄瓜，又名王瓜、胡瓜。黄瓜富含蛋白质、钙、磷、铁、钾、胡萝卜素、维生素B2、维生素c、维生素E及烟酸等营养素。 黄瓜食疗药效 黄瓜中含有精氨酸等必需氨基酸，对肝脏病人的康复很有益处。 黄瓜所含的丙醇二酸，有抑制糖类物质在机体内转化为脂肪的作用，因而肥胖症、高脂血症、高血压、冠心病患者，常吃黄瓜既可减肥、降血脂、降血压，又可使体形健美、身体康复。 黄瓜汁有美容皮肤的作用，还可防治皮肤色素沉着。 黄瓜顶部的苦味中富含葫芦素c的成分，具有抗癌作用。 

Old cucumber is a good "cooling soup", very suitable for hot humid places like Singapore. It is anti-aging, helps with weight loss and good for the skin. It is also high in dietary fiber, calcium, iron and rich in vitamin A, B6, and C. I made it not because of the abovementioned benefits, but because it was going for a discount. I was shopping at the neighborhood mama shop because I wanted to buy cinnamon powder for the buns and saw that the shop still had some veggies left. Normally I would be very against the idea of buying veggies so late (you know the early bird nonsense) but I hadn't bought any on Saturday morning because B1 attended a wedding lunch and I stayed home to wrestle with *censored*.

Usually everyone would leave the ugly ass brown skin on while cooking this because they worry that the skin would be too mushy and disappear into the soup. However because I use an electric crockpot and not a claypot on the gas, I don't need to worry about that and I think the skin is goddamn disgustingly hideous and unhygenic, so I happily shaved the skin off. 

I dumped scallops, pork ribs, old cucumber, dates and wolfberries and boiled the hell of it. Accompanied by a simple beef stew (no wine was harmed in the making of this dish) and baby xiaobaicai (I can never understand why this green veggie is called xiaobaicai, literal translation: little white veggie).