Water Volume for Soup and Braise | Generated by AI
Short answer: it depends on what you’re making.
- Soup (山药猪肉汤, Cantonese-style slow soup) → 8 cups (~2L). On a traditional 灶头 with a strong open flame, you’ll lose 20–30% of the water to evaporation over 1–1.5 hours of simmering, even with the lid mostly on. Starting with 4 cups would leave you with barely any soup.
- Braise (炖/焖, meat as the main dish with yam chunks) → 4 cups (~1L) is plenty. You want the liquid to reduce into a sauce, not stay soupy.
Since pork + 山药 is classically a soup combo, here’s the soup version:A more reliable heuristic than counting cups: water should cover everything by 3–4 cm at the start. That self-corrects for pot size and how much meat you’re using. If you’re making the braised version instead, use 4 cups, keep the lid off for the last 15 minutes, and let it reduce.