Indonesian Chicken and Sweetcorn Soup That Beats Any Packet Version

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This Indonesian-style chicken and sweetcorn soup is thickened naturally with corn juice and egg drop — real chicken broth, real flavor. No packet, no cream, no shortcuts.

Chicken Sweetcorn Soup

This chicken and sweetcorn soup is made with a proper homemade broth. It is cooked with real chicken, fresh or frozen sweetcorn, and a ginger-garlic base that fills your kitchen with the kind of smell that makes everyone wonder what’s cooking.

This isn’t the watery, bland version you get from a packet. It’s an Indonesian-style soup, passed down from a mom’s kitchen and quietly tweaked over the years to work with ingredients you can actually find at a UK supermarket. The sweetcorn does double duty here: half the kernels are mashed to release their natural juices, which thicken the broth without any cream or heavy starch. Two beaten eggs go in at the end, swirled into ribbons through the hot soup. Simple technique, big result.

It works as a starter, a light lunch with buttered toast, or honestly, breakfast, if you grew up eating it that way. And if someone in your house is fighting off a cold, this is the soup you make.

Not only does this sweet corn and chicken soup keep you warm as you enjoy it, but it is also believed to have anti-inflammatory effects that can ease cold symptoms. 

And the chicken and sweetcorn soup is low in calories, so you won’t feel guilty when you have it in large portions. 

How to Serve Sweetcorn and Chicken Soup

When I was young, my mom used to make this sweetcorn-and-chicken soup for breakfast. We used to have it with garlic bread or a piece of toast. 

But often we had it on its own as a starter/ appetizer or as a snack between mealtimes. 

As a snack, you can pair the soup with either Indonesian sweetcorn fritters/ perkedel jagung or mung bean fritters/ perkedel kacang Hijau. 

You can enjoy your soup on its own or with a dash of your favorite chili sauce. The soup is lovely to have with fresh bread rolls or a simple buttered toast for a light lunch. Or you can serve the soup as a starter. It’s your choice.

Why You’ll Love This Recipe

• It thickens itself naturally. Half the sweetcorn kernels get mashed before going into the pot. The released corn juice acts as a natural thickener — no heavy cream, no excess cornflour needed to get that satisfying, silky consistency.
• Boneless chicken cuts the cooking time without sacrificing flavor. Most traditional versions rely on bone-in chicken simmered for hours. This recipe uses boneless chicken and still produces a broth that tastes genuinely homemade. Bones-in works too if that’s what you have — it’ll just taste even richer.
• Ginger and garlic do the heavy lifting on flavor. Just two aromatics, fried briefly in oil until fragrant, build the entire flavor base. No long spice list, no hard-to-find ingredients. Ready-minced ginger-garlic paste works perfectly.
• The egg drop technique is easier than it looks. You pour two lightly beaten eggs into the hot, stirring soup, and they set instantly into soft ribbons — adding texture, a little richness, and that unmistakable look of a proper sweetcorn soup.
• Fresh or frozen sweetcorn both work — tinned doesn’t. Tinned sweetcorn is pre-cooked and won’t release the starch needed to thicken the broth or give you that clean, sweet corn flavor. Fresh cobs are ideal, frozen kernels are a solid second.
• It’s genuinely low-calorie. No cream, no butter, no heavy base. You can have a large bowl without any guilt; it’s just as good as a light lunch as it is a starter.
• It’s a cold-weather and cold-fighting soup. Ginger and garlic both have well-documented anti-inflammatory properties. This is the soup worth making when someone at home is run down, congested, or just needs something warm and easy to eat.
• Endlessly flexible to serve. Have it on its own with fresh bread rolls or buttered toast, or alongside Indonesian sweetcorn fritters if you want to go all in. Add chili sauce at the table for heat. It fits a starter, a snack, or a full light meal.

The Main Ingredients for Chicken and Sweetcorn Soup

This heartwarming, delicious sweet corn chicken soup requires only simple ingredients. And you don’t need many ingredients to make it, and many items are pretty much ordinary things you always have in your kitchen.

• Chicken: Ideally, use bone-in chicken and make proper chicken stock in a few hours to capture the flavor and goodness of the poultry. However, my recipe uses boneless chicken, which shortens the cooking time. Yet, you still get the nice chicken flavor just like any other chicken stock/ broth. The only difference is that you may have to cook a little longer. Because it takes more time for the chicken with bones to become fully cooked. But the good thing is your soup will taste richer as the bones give more flavor. 
• Sweetcorn: Ideally, you use kernels of fresh sweetcorn cobs. But you can also use the frozen sweetcorn kernels. I won’t recommend you use the tinned sweetcorn, though, because it’s pre-cooked. The raw sweetcorn can also help thicken the soup. You can mash half of the kernels until they release their juices. The corn juice will be the natural soup thickening ingredient. 
• Ginger and garlic: These are the main flavoring ingredients. I used the ready-minced ginger-garlic. But you can make your own ginger paste and garlic paste.
• Peppercorn: Traditionally, this soup uses white pepper. But I use ground black peppercorns more often than not. 
• Spring onions/scallions: I love spring onions/scallions in the soup. It just adds a nice flavor to the sweetcorn chicken soup. 
• Eggs: You only need two lightly beaten eggs for this recipe. The eggs and the sweetcorn juice will help thicken the soup. 

How to Make Chicken and Sweetcorn Soup

1. Pre-boil the chicken in ½ liter of boiling water, then drain. Then shred the poultry into slivers. 
2. Fry the ginger-garlic paste and pepper in a little oil until fragrant.
3. Add boiling water from the kettle, then add in the chicken pieces, salt, and 1 ½ liters of hot boiling water. Let it cook and simmer for at least half an hour to make your broth. The longer you cook, the richer your soup will be.
4. Mash half the sweetcorn kernels, then add them to the chicken stock.
5. After letting it cook for about 5 minutes, add the beaten eggs and keep stirring the soup. The egg drop will create ribbons in the soup.
6. Stir in the sliced spring onions, then add the cornflour mixed with four tablespoons of water to the soup as you stir. Keep mixing for a while until everything is nicely mixed. And let it cook for a few more minutes once the soup starts to reboil.

Thank you and all the best.

Chicken and sweet corn soup

5 from 8 votes

This chicken and sweet corn soup is very easy to make and doesn't need a lot of ingredients. It's delicious and nutritious. A perfect choice for a starter or even a light lunch menu.

BY: Devy Dar

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Prep : 15 minutes mins

Cook : 50 minutes mins

Total : 1 hour hr 5 minutes mins

Servings: 8

Equipment

• Cooking pan
• Wooden spoon
• Chopping board
• Kitchen knife

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Ingredients

 

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US CustomaryMetric

• 2 pieces boneless chicken breast or boneless chicken thigh. Cut in small pieces.
• 1 ½ cup sweet corn kernels. From 2 fresh sweet corn cobs. Mash half of the kernels.
• 2 eggs lightly beaten.
• 8 cups water hot boiling from the kettle.
• 1 ½ teaspoon salt.
• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper.
• ½ inch ginger, minced.
• 3 cloves of garlic, minced.
• 1 tablespoon cooking oil.
• 3 spring onions/ scallions finely sliced.
• 4 tablespoons cornflour/ cornstarch mixed with 4 tablespoons of cold water.

Instructions

• Clean the chicken and cut in chunks. Boil them in ½ litre of hot boiling water (from the kettle) until the poultry is just cooked through. Drain the water, and shred the chicken using two forks or hands. Set aside.
• And fry the ginger garlic and pepper in a cooking pan until it’s fragrant. 
• Add the chicken pieces and salt in the spices. Then put 1 ½ litre of hot boiling water in and leave it to cook for about 20 minutes. If you use chicken with bones, you can include the bones in. Just don’t forget to take them out before serving. 
• Then add the sweet corn in. Stir well and continue to cook with the lid on until the sweetcorn is almost fully cooked for about 5 minutes.
• Next, add in the spring onion/ scallions slices. And the beaten eggs as you stir the soup carefully. You want to create a membrane-like pattern of the eggs in your soup.
• Put the lid on and leave it to cook and simmer for another 5-10 minutes.
• Mix 4 tablespoons of cornflour/ cornstarch with 4 tablespoons of cold water. Pour it into the soup at the same time you stir the soup gently. You can see that your soup is getting more thickened now.
• After cooking further for a minute or two, your chicken and sweet corn soup are ready.

Notes

• If you don’t have boneless chicken, you can always use chicken with bone. For this recipe, half of a baby chicken should be enough. But don’t skip boiling the chicken and draining the water first before you start cooking the poultry for the actual soup. The reason is that you want to get rid of the dirt and smell of the chicken. Also, your soup will look nicely clear and not muddy. 
• Ideally, you use fresh sweet corn and remove the kernels from the cobs. However, you can use frozen ones as well. Just make sure they’re raw frozen sweetcorn kernels, not cooked kernels. And please don’t use tinned sweetcorn kernels, because they are cooked. You can mash half of the corn until they release their juice to add more flavour. But it’s okay even if you don’t do it. Your soup will still be yummy ?.
• If you happen to put too much water and the soup is runnier than how you want it to be, you can always fix it by adding more cornflour/ cornstarch. Just mix a teaspoon of the starch with a teaspoon of cold water. Then pour it in the soup as you stir the soup. 

Nutrition

Serving: 1g | Calories: 165kcal | Carbohydrates: 11g | Protein: 18g | Fat: 6g | Saturated Fat: 1g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 4g | Cholesterol: 95mg | Sodium: 511mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 2g

Devy Dar

Devy founded So Yummy Recipes and Drizzling Flavor to share her love of food after exploring various cultures and cuisines for more than two decades. Her mission is to help others easily recreate traditional and non-traditional food with readily available ingredients. Her works have been featured in Reader’s Digest, Al Jazeera, MSN, Yahoo, Bon Appétit, and more.