Ramen Noodle Soup Recipe

Delicious Simple Ramen Noodle Soup

INGREDIENTS:

• 3 1/2 cups vegetable broth
• 1 (3.5 ounce) package ramen noodles with dried vegetables
• 2 teaspoons soy sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon chili oil
• 1/2 teaspoon minced fresh ginger root
• 2 green onions, sliced

DIRECTIONS:

1. In a medium saucepan combine broth and noodles. Cover and bring to a boil over high heat; stir to break up noodles. Reduce heat to medium and add soy sauce, chili oil and ginger. Simmer, uncovered, for 10 minutes. Stir in sesame oil and garnish with green onions.               

COOKBOOKS I HIGHLY RECOMMEND:
Japanese Hot Pots: Comforting One-Pot Meals

Japanese Udon Soup Recipe

Delicious Kake Udon Noodle Soup

INGREDIENTS:

• 6 ounces udon noodles (or 2 servings)
• 1 1/2 cups dashi (Japanese fish stock)
• 2 tablespoons mirin, plus
• 1 teaspoon mirin
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1/4 teaspoon salt (optional)
• 1 teaspoon fresh ginger, grated
• green onion, chopped

Optional toppings:

• fish cake, sliced (kamaboko)
• toasted sesame seeds
• tempura scraps (tenkasu)
• shichimi togarashi (Japanese 7-spice pepper)

DIRECTIONS:

1. Heat a large pot of water for cooking the udon noodles.
2. Meanwhile, bring dashi to a simmer. Add mirin, soy sauce and salt (optional). Continue simmering until ready to use.
3. Cook the udon noodles according to the package instructions.
4. Divide drained, cooked udon into two large, deep serving bowls.
5. Top with grated ginger, chopped green onion, and fish cake slices (optional).
6. Pour in simmering broth to fill both bowls.
7. Top with optional toasted sesame seeds, shichimi togarashi, and/or tenkasu.

COOKBOOKS I HIGHLY RECOMMEND:
Japanese Hot Pots: Comforting One-Pot Meals

Wonton Noodle Soup Recipe - Chinese Dumpling Noodle Soup

Delicious Wonton Noodle Soup

INGREDIENTS:

Noodles:

• 1/2 pound fresh chinese egg noodles
• 1 tablespoon peanut oil

Wontons:

• 1/2 pound shrimp, peeled and deveined
• 1 1/2 teaspoons coarse salt
• 3/4 pound medium-grind pork butt
• 1 tablespoon chinese rice wine or dry sherry
• 2 teaspoons light soy sauce
• 1 green onion, minced
• 2 tablespoons drained, minced canned bamboo shoots
• 1/4 teaspoon sugar
• Big pinch of white pepper
• 1 teaspoon Asian sesame oil
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch
• 60 wonton wrappers
• 1 egg white, lightly beaten

Broth:

• 6 cups chicken stock
• 1/4 teaspoon sugar
• Light soy sauce to taste
• 1 tablespoon Asian sesame oil
• 1 pound bok choy, cut into 2 inch lengths
• 1 green onion, chopped

DIRECTIONS:

Noodles:

1. Bring a large pot three-fourths full of water to a boil and salt it lightly. Gently pull the strands of noodles apart, then drop them into the boiling water, stirring to separate the strands. Bring to a second boil and cook for 1 minute longer.
2. Pour the noodles into a colander and rinse thoroughly with cold running water. Drain well and transfer to a large bowl.
3. Toss with the oil to keep the strands from sticking together.

Wontons:

1. Rinse the shrimp with cold water. Drain. Place in a bowl
2. Add 1 teaspoon of the salt and toss well; set aside for 10 minutes.
3. Rinse the shrimp in cold water again; drain thoroughly, pat dry and chop coarsely.
4. In a bowl, mix together the remaining 1/2 teaspoon salt, the shrimp, pork, wine or sherry, soy sauce, green onion, bamboo shoots, sugar, white pepper, sesame oil and cornstarch.
5. Wrapping the dumplings: work with 1 wrapper at a time, keeping unused wrappers covered with a kitchen towel. Place 1 heaping teaspoon of filling in the center of a wrapper. Moisten the wrapper edges with water and fold in half to form a triangle, enclosing the filling. Bring the two long ends up and over to meet and slightly overlap over the top of the filling. Moisten where the edges overlap with egg white and press together to seal. Set on a baking sheet and cover with another kitchen towel. Continue to form dumplings until all the filling has been used. Set aside 3 dozen dumplings for this dish; wrap the remainder and any unused wrappers in plastic wrap and freeze for up to 2 months.

Assembly:

1. In a saucepan, heat the chicken stock and season with the sugar, soy sauce and sesame oil. At the same time, bring a large pot three-fourths full of water to a boil, salt lightly and add the bok choy. Boil for 1 minute; then, using a slotted spoon or tongs, transfer to a bowl and set aside. When the stock is hot, drop in the noodles for a few seconds to reheat. Using the spoon or tongs, scoop out the noodles and divide them among 6 warmed deep soup bowls; keep warm.
2. Drop 3 dozen wonton dumplings into the boiling water. Cook until they float to the top, about 3 minutes. Using the spoon, scoop out the dumplings and place approximately 6 dumplings in each bowl. Top with the bok choy and ladle over the hot stock. Garnish with the green onion and serve hot.

Thanks to: Weldon Owen

COOKBOOKS I HIGHLY RECOMMEND:
A Tradition of Soup: Flavors from China's Pearl River Delta

Bun Rieu Recipe - Crab and Pork Noodle Soup

Delicious Bun Rieu

INGREDIENTS:

Broth:

• 5 quarts of water
• 1 lb pork bones
• 1 lb chicken bones
• 3 small crabs
• 1 chopped onion
• 6-8 large tomatoes
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 Tbsp fermented shrimp sauce
• 1 Tbsp fish sauce

Crab Paste:

• canola or vegetable oil
• 2 shallots, finely minced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tsp fermented shrimp paste
• 2 tsp chili garlic sauce
• 2 Tbsp fresh crabmeat extracted from the fresh crabs

Meatballs:

• 1 cup of crabmeat extracted from the fresh crabs
• 1/2 cup dried shrimp
• 1/2 lb ground pork
• 1 Tbsp fish sauce
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 of the crab paste mixture (see ingredients above)
• 4 eggs

Garnishes:

• water spinach stems
• 1 banana flower
• scallions
• assortment of Vietnamese herbs, such as cilantro, mint, purple perilla, Vietnamese coriander, and Vietnamese balm
• bean sprouts
• extra fermented shrimp paste
• lime

DIRECTIONS:

1. Parboil the pork and chicken bones in water. Rinse. Then fill a stockpot with about 5 quarts of water. Add the parboiled pork and chicken bones to the stockpot and boil. Skim off any scum and fat that forms at the top. (We actually had premade pork stock and chicken stock frozen from previous cooking, so we simply defrosted those and reheated them in the pot together.)
2. Scrub the crabs clean. This may be a little daunting if your crabs are still alive. You can either use gloves or tongs to grab the middle of the crab from behind with one hand (so it won’t be able to pinch you) and scrub it down under running water with the other hand. Or you can do what my mom does, which is kill the crab first by lifting the flap on its underside and stabbing it in the center with a chopstick. (Gruesome, I know… the things moms do to feed us a loving meal.)
3. In a separate pot, boil just enough water to cover the crabs. Once the water boils, add the crabs and cook until they turn bright orange. This should only take a few minutes. Lift out the crabs and take them apart to extract the meat, fat, and tomalley. Reserve all this for later. Add the crab’s cooking liquid and the crab shells to the large stockpot with the pork and chicken bones, and continue to simmer. (If you are using premade pork and chicken stock, you can make the process easier by putting the crab shells into a colander and submerging the whole colander into the stock. This will make it easier to remove the shells without having to strain the entire pot of stock. If you are making the stock from scratch, the whole pot of liquid will need to be strained before serving.)
4. To make the crab paste, heat a bit of canola or vegetable oil. Saute the chopped shallots and garlic in the oil along with 2 tsp of shrimp paste, 2 tsp of chili garlic sauce, and 2 Tbsp of the crabmeat. Reserve half of the crab paste for the stock and half for the meatballs.
5. Heat some oil in a saute pan over medium-high heat. Add the chopped onion and saute until soft. Add the tomatoes and 1/2 tsp of salt. Saute until the tomatoes break down and their liquid has evaporated, about 10 minutes. Add the shrimp paste and 1 Tbsp fish sauce, and stir until fragrant. Add a ladleful of stock to the pan and scrape up all the bits at the bottom. Turn off heat. At this point, if your stock has been simmering for at least an hour, strain out all the pork and chicken bones and crab shells. Add half of the crab paste and all of the onion and tomato mixture to the pot of stock and continue simmering.
6. To make the meatballs, first rehydrate the dried shrimp by covering it with some of the boiling stock. Let this sit for about 15 minutes. Drain and add the liquid back into the stock. Mince the shrimp by hand or in a food processor. Add the rest of the crabmeat into the food processor with the minced shrimp. Pulse a few times to mix together, but do not pulverize the crabmeat. In a bowl, mix the minced shrimp and crabmeat with the ground pork, 1 Tbsp fish sauce, 1/2 tsp salt, the remaining half of the crab paste mixture, and 4 beaten eggs. Set aside.
7. Soak the rice noodles for about half an hour. Boil a separate pot of water for the noodles
8. While the noodles are soaking and the water is boiling, assemble the herb plate. Take the water spinach stems and cut lengthwise into long, thin strips. Soak in cold water. The strips will curl. Prepare a bowl of water with about 1 tsp of salt for the banana flower. Remove the petals of the banana flower. I use only the petals and discard the stems inside, as they are astringent, but some people like to to keep them. Stack the petals together and slice into about thin shreds. Soak in the salt water to keep from browning. Keep the banana flower in the water until ready to serve. Cut the lime into wedges. Wash the scallions, cut into 2-inch pieces and then cut the pieces into thin strips. Wash and dry the herbs and bean sprouts. Assemble the water spinach stems, herbs, bean sprouts, and lime onto a plate, leaving room to add the shredded banana flower right before serving.
9. When the pot of water boils, add the noodles. Cook for about 3 minutes, until al dente. Drain and rinse with cold water. Put an overturned bowl into a larger bowl. Pour the drained noodles into the larger bowl. The overturned bowl will help the noodles not cling together too much. Set aside.
10. Keeping the broth at a gentle simmer, drop in spoonfuls of the crabmeat, shrimp, and ground pork mixture. Add the fried tofu.
11. Place one serving of noodles into a strainer and dunk into the simmering stock for 5–10 seconds. Loosen the noodles with chopsticks. Lift the strainer carefully, allowing the stock to drain back into the pot. Place the noodles in a serving bowl. Repeat with each serving of noodles.
12. To assemble the noodle bowls, add several pieces of fried tofu and meatballs over the noodles. Ladle broth generously into the bowl, being sure to get some tomatoes in as well.
13. Serve with the plate of garnishes (including the banana flower), allowing guests to add the vegetables, herbs, squeezes of lime, extra dollops of shrimp paste, and chili garlic oil if desired

Thanks to: www.meatlovessalt.com

COOKBOOKS I HIGHLY RECOMMEND:
Into the Vietnamese Kitchen: Treasured Foodways, Modern Flavors

Bun Bo Hue Recipe - Spicy Lemongrass Pork and Beef Noodle Soup

Delicious Bun Bo Hue

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 lb ham hock
• 6 stalks lemongrass, crushed and sliced thin
• 2 tablespoons nuoc nam
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 2 teaspoons shrimp paste (mam ruoc)
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 4 ounces boneless sirloin
• 4 ounces boneless pork loin
• 16 ounces rice noodles, cooked
• 1 cup bean sprouts
• 4 sprigs Thai holy basil (regular basil ok)
• 4 sprigs fresh mint
• 4 sprigs fresh cilantro
• 4 teaspoons sambal oelek or 4 teaspoons hot chili sauce
• 4 -8 fresh Thai red chili peppers (optional)
• 1 lime, cut into quarters

DIRECTIONS:

1. Bring 2 1/2 quarts water to a boil; add ham hocks and lemongrass.
2. Skim constantly for 10 minutes then cover the pan, reduce heat and simmer for 1 1/2-2 hours.
3. Strain the broth, reserving ham hocks if you desire them.
4. Dilute the shrimp paste in 1/4 cup of cold water and set aside for 10 minutes.
5. Add nuoc mam, shrimp paste solution, sugar, salt and pepper,sirloin, and pork loin to the broth and simmer for 10-15 minutes or until meat is cooked and tender; remove meat.
6. Thinly slice meats into small pieces.
7. To serve, place a portion of noodles in serving bowl, top with some bean sprouts, pork, beef, and some ham hock (if using) ,and ladle the broth over; add herbs, chili sauce, chilis, and lime juice to taste.

COOKBOOK I HIGHLY RECOMMEND:
Into the Vietnamese Kitchen: Treasured Foodways, Modern Flavors