How long should dried lotus seeds be soaked before cooking porridge

In life, many people like to drink porridge, which has many benefits for the body. When cooking porridge, you can put many ingredients together. In this way, the porridge will taste better and be more nutritious. Lotus seed porridge is a kind of porridge that people prefer. When cooking lotus seed porridge, if you use fresh lotus seeds, you can just wash them and then cook them. If you use dried lotus seeds, you need to soak them in water for a certain period of time.

How long to soak dried lotus seeds

It is recommended to soak dried lotus seeds for at least 3 hours in advance when cooking porridge. Some people are accustomed to soaking the lotus seeds overnight in advance. However, if the lotus seeds are grown in hot weather, they may easily deteriorate.

Should I use hot water or cold water to soak lotus seeds?

Lotus seeds can be soaked in cold water or warm water (the water temperature should generally be around 70 to 80 degrees). However, it is not suitable to soak in boiling water for a long time. In addition, if the lotus seeds are not peeled, you can simmer them in boiling water with alkaline for a while before soaking, and then soak them after peeling.

How to make lotus seeds easier to cook

1. Soak in hot alkaline water, the ratio is one part alkali and ten parts water. After the alkali is dissolved, soak the lotus seeds for about an hour. Knead the lotus seeds with your hands until the skin falls off, then soak in hot water again. The lotus seed meat will swell and will become mushy when boiled.

2. Put the lotus seeds in the freezer for a day, then take them out and cook them, they will easily become mushy. You don’t need a pressure cooker to cook lotus seeds. Simply boil them for 5 minutes, turn off the heat and simmer on the stove. Wait until the pot cools down a little, then turn the heat back on and boil. Repeat this three times.

Do you need to remove the core of lotus seeds when cooking porridge?

The lotus seed core tastes bitter, so if you don’t remove the lotus seed core, it will be more effective in clearing away heat and reducing fire. However, when using lotus seeds to cook soup or porridge, the soup will taste bitter if the core is not removed. Moreover, the core of lotus seeds is cold in nature. People with weak constitution, cold stomach and fear of cold should not eat lotus seeds with the core. Eating too much lotus seed heart can also cause abdominal pain, diarrhea and other uncomfortable symptoms.

In short, from a medical point of view, lotus seeds with lotus seeds have one more effect than those with hollow lotus seeds, and that is the effect of lotus seeds: clearing the heart and removing heat. However, lotus seeds have a bitter taste. So, from the perspective of taste, it has a bitter taste, which is not acceptable to most people, so it tastes better with the core removed than without. When middle-aged and elderly people buy it, they mostly choose not to remove the core because of the multiple medicinal properties. But when middle-aged and young people buy it, they mostly remove the core because of the multiple taste properties.