Chicken-Coconut Soup

Back in North Carolina after my Peace Corps service, and homesick for Thailand, I tried making this soup. To my amazement, it was spectacular, bright and bracing with lime juice and galanga, and comforting, like all the world’s chicken soups. It was so easy and so good, it inspired me to keep right on cooking Thai food. I used big woody chips of dried galanga for my first version of this soup; thin, crisp slices of fresh galanga after I moved out to Southern California; and fresh ginger, ga