Asian-esque Improv (Noodle Soup)

Ever have a bunch of Asian ingredients sitting around from various recipe experiments and are completely disillusioned by recipes you've grabbed off of the internet? You know how it goes, "Oh, that looks like a good recipe." Nope, not at all. If you could find that person you would hold them down and make them open their mouth to make sure that they have a tongue.

So make up something. This is me throwing together a noodley soup.

Step 1: Soup Base

Start with a stock. I found a 5 pound package of pork ribs for $4. Bang! Stock! Use whatever you can find cheap. Chicken, pork, beef, lamb, whatever. You need not make your noodley soup Asian-esque, make it you-esque.

Pick out your flavor enchancers for your stock.

I used: Onions, garlic, ginger, kombu, and dried shiitake mushrooms. Use whatever veggies you like. The basics are carrot, onion, and celery. But basics are boring, so shake it up.

I added oil to my pot, got a little color on the onions, garlic, and ginger.
Added the ribs to color up a bit and drive off some of their water.
Then, funny enough, added water.
Once that came up to a boil I added the kombu and mushrooms and checked for salt.
I added salt.
Turned down the heat to a lazy simmer and let it ride for five hours.

Notes:

If you want a clear broth, then you're going to have to par boil your meats to get the residual blood out. Then you're going to have to rinse them. It seems like such a waste of water to me. I'm not cooking for the Queen of Stuckupistan here, I just want to eat.

I do strain my stock though. That's what that fancy chinoise (fine mesh strainer) is for.

Comments

[WriterChick]

Thanks for the warning about the yellow cake, which of course cracked me up. This looks wonderful, and I love the flexibility of the instructions. "A little bit of this, or if you don't like, some of that." True cooking freedom!

[Penolopy Bulnick]

That soup looks wonderful! It has so much substance to it :)

[dlewisa]

Definitely not a warm weather soup.