Spicy Szechuan Dumpling Soup

4.59 from 29 votes

This spicy Szechuan dumpling soup is like a warm hug for your stomach. The savory, sweet, and powerful umami flavors make for the perfect meal on a cold night.

Servings cups

Prep Time 5

Cook Time 50

Total Time 55

Ingredients

¼ cup light brown sugar
6 tablespoons low sodium soy sauce
3 tablespoons rice vinegar
2 tablespoons chili oil
1 tablespoon hoisin
2 teaspoons sesame oil
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 teaspoon Szechuan peppercorn freshly ground
1 teaspoon powdered ginger
½ teaspoon salt
2⅔ cup low sodium vegetable broth
1⅓ cup low sodium chicken broth
Pork dumplings 6 to 8 per cup of soup, if serving for dinner (see notes for serving suggestions)
2 scallions sliced

Instructions

In a small bowl, whisk together the brown sugar, soy sauce, rice vinegar, chili oil, hoisin, sesame oil, minced garlic, ground Szechuan peppercorn, powdered ginger, and salt until well-combined.
Next, add the vegetable broth and chicken broth to a saucepan. Then add the sauce you just mixed, and stir to combine.
Cook soup over medium high heat until just boiling, about 10 minutes, then lower to a simmer (medium to medium-low heat) and cook until reduced by about one third, stirring occasionally. This should take about 30 to 40 minutes.
Serve soup immediately over steamed pork dumplings and top with sliced scallions.

Notes

Pork dumplings: We recommend making a fresh batch of our homemade pork dumplings (get the recipe here!) to go in this Szechuan soup. They soak up the soup so perfectly and are surprisingly easy to make! To time things properly, mix up the pork filling for the dumplings before getting the soup started on your stove. Then fold the dumplings while the soup cooks (keeping an eye on it and stirring occasionally) and cook as many dumplings as you want once you're done folding. Store the rest in the freezer for easy meals later on! Alternatively, use your favorite store-bought dumplings.

Vegetarian option: You can easily make this recipe vegetarian by just using 4 cups of vegetable broth instead of combining vegetable and chicken broth. Serve with your favorite veggie dumplings!

Serving suggestions: This Szechuan soup is delicious as a meal, appetizer, side dish, or snack. Serve a cup of soup with 6 to 8 dumplings for a filling dinner, or serve half cups of soup with about 3 or 4 dumplings as an appetizer or side. Or, serve your favorite dumplings in just a small amount of this soup so it acts as a dumpling sauce (so delicious). The possibilities are endless!

Storing and reheating: This soup will stay good in the fridge for 3 to 4 days stored in an airtight container. If you have leftover steamed dumplings, you can store those easily too - check out our blog post above for detailed instructions. To reheat, simply heat the soup in a covered saucepan over medium heat for about 10 minutes or until warmed through.

Scaling: This recipe easily scales to feed a crowd. Our homemade pork dumplings recipe makes about 50 dumplings, so you can scale this soup recipe by 3x and have the right proportions for serving dumpling soup at a potluck or dinner party with lots of people!

Author: Alex Langdon

Calories: 506kcal

Course: Appetizer, Dinner, Lunch, Main Course, Side Dish

Cuisine: Asian, Chinese

Keyword: brown sugar, chicken broth, chili oil, garlic, ginger, hoisin, pork dumplings, rice vinegar, sesame oil, soy sauce, Szechuan peppercorn, vegetable broth

Nutrition