Warm Comforting Ramen Soup

Making your own ramen isn't as difficult as I thought it would be, just make sure you use fresh vegetables! This recipe makes enough pork liquid to use many times for leftovers; however there is only enough dashi (or stock) for one meal, unless you double it for more later.

I had the sheer pleasure of finding an International Grocery store that sold all these items, including fresh cut udon noodles, which I used instead of the smaller ramen noodles. If you don't know the difference, udon noodles are thicker (my preference), have a little bit more flavor to them and they are vegan. Ramen noodles are made with eggs, are smaller and take less time to cook. Use whatever your preference is in the recipe.

I also like to have chicken in my ramen and in this case, I left out the pork. Both are extremely good, I was just crunching on time so I used rotisserie chicken breast. I sliced it in larger pieces and cooked it in place of the pork.

You can also add kombu (edible kelp) and nori (edible seaweed) to your ramen but I don't like the taste and texture of either so I leave them out. When I get sushi I even have them wrap it in soy paper, instead of nori.

One other comment for ramen is that this is shoyu based and does not have any miso paste. If you prefer a miso ramen or shio, then I would say still try this because it was amazing.

I would love to hear your comments on how you make ramen!

Ingredients:

• 8 oz fresh udon noodles (or ramen)

Chicken Dashi (stock)

• 8 cups (64 oz) chicken broth, use low sodium

• 16 dried shiitake mushrooms

• 25 g bonito flakes (bonito is a type of fish)

Pork:

• 1 1/4 cup low sodium soy sauce

• 1 3/4 cup mirin

• 1 1/2 cup water

• 1/4 cup granulated sugar

• 2 Tablespoons packed brown sugar

• 1 piece of 2" ginger, sliced thinly

• 3 cloves of garlic, peeled and smashed

• 3 green onions, sliced in half (you don't have to cut off the root)

• 1 pound pork belly, skin on, cut into 2" wide chunks

To make each individual bowl serving:

• 4 oz noodles (I made two servings out of the 8 oz)

• 1 1/2 cups chicken dashi

• 2 fresh shiitake mushrooms, sliced

• 4 Tablespoons reserved soy liquid

• 2 slices of pork (or chicken)

• 1 soft-boiled egg, halved (I like mine almost completely boiled, because I don't love the extra runny egg)

• 1 thinly sliced green onion, white and green parts

• Few drops of Chili Sesame oil

• Optional: fresh bean sprouts, baby bok choy, snap peas, toasted sesame seeds

Directions:

1. Make the stock first by bringing chicken broth to a bare simmer in a medium saucepan over medium heat. You aren't going to boil this so take it off the heat when you see small bubbles appearing. Let cool about 2 minutes. Add in the dried shiitake mushrooms and let it steep for 5 minutes. Then, add in bonito flakes and let it steep for 5 more minutes. Strain all the mushrooms and bonito out and set aside. You can also make this ahead and store chilled for up to a week.

2. Work on your pork next by bringing all the ingredients, except the pork, to a simmer over medium heat in a medium sized saucepan. Once it starts to simmer, turn the heat down to low.

3. At the same time, start bringing the pork belly and 6 cups of water to a low simmer. Drain immediately and risk the pork. I skip this step when I use only chicken.

4. Place pork (or chicken like I mentioned) in soy sauce mixture and bring to a simmer. Cover and continue to cook on low until everything is tender, turning the pork occasionally. This will take about 1 hour and 20 minutes. If you substitute the rotisserie chicken, it will take about 20 minutes.

5. Let the pork cool for about 20 minutes, then strain and reserve the liquid for serving. Any leftover pork and soy liquid should be refrigerated separately. Slice pork before serving.

6. Cook your udon (or ramen) noodles in a pot of salted boiling water, stirring with tongs until al dente. Udon noodles take about 3-4 minutes from fresh, whereas ramen can be done in about 1 minute. If you used dried noodles, cooking time will take longer up to 8 minutes depending on your preference.

7. To make your serving bowls, heat up your stock and fresh mushrooms until low simmer. Cook for about 1 minute. Add to bowl on top of noodles.

8. Top with pork (or chicken), reserved soy liquid egg, green onion, chili oil and any of the optional ingredients.

Enjoy! Let me know if you have questions as I stumbled a few times until I got this one right.

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