Ramen

To be honest, I didn’t know what all the fuss was about until I pushed a sliding door open and walked into a tiny Ramen joint in Itaewon one cold February lunchtime. They only sold one type of Ramen. One mouth burning taste later, and I was hooked.

Unlike most Japanese dishes, Ramen is not bound by tradition. Anyone can make Ramen. And this one is straightforward and can be pulled together in less than one hour.

Photo by Cody Chan on Unsplash

There are several elements to a good bowl of Ramen:

The broth — it can be mild or burn your face off hot, it can be fatty or creamy, clear or cloudy, it can take hours to make, like Sarah Gavigan in her Ramen Otaku Book or be cobbled together from stock cubes, a good example is Instant Chicken Ramen in Our Korean Kitchen by Jordan Bourke and Rejina Pyo.

In this recipe, I have not chosen to go down the broth and tare route. That’s more complicated, and I will leave that for the real Ramen geeks.

The Toppings — here you can do anything you like, but I think less is more. In this recipe, I have chosen vegetable toppings and an egg. But chicken is good, rare beef, and of course, SPAM works!

The Bowl — I think you need a good bowl for your Ramen. I like these from Sous Chef You will need a spoon, chopsticks and finally an excellent slurping technique.

Super Simple Vegetable Ramen

This will make two generous portions.

Ingredients for Broth:

• 2 vegetable stock cubes/pots
• 20ml Worcester Sauce
• 10ml Fish Sauce
• 20ml Rice Vinegar
• 10gr Gochujang (add as much as you like if you like it spicy)
• 20ml Soy Sauce
• 5gr Chinese Five Spice
• Pinch Chilli Flakes
• 5gr Red Pepper Flakes (Deol-maewoon gochu-garu)
• 1 Star Anise whole
• 1 Small Onion
• 2 cloves of garlic smashed
• 1 Thumb size piece of ginger cut into strips
• 2 Lt Cold Water

Ingredients for the Bowl including toppings:

• 1 pkg Ramen Noodles (I like Nongshim shin ramyun noodles)
• 50gr Frozen Peas
• 2 Pak Choi quartered or Long-Stemmed Broccoli, or cabbage cut into strips
• 20 gr roasted red peppers (do it yourself or buy ready to go in a jar)
• 1 Egg
• 1 Sheet of Kombu (Japanese Seaweed) Optional.

Method:

1. Combine all of the Stock ingredients into a 3 Lt Pan with a lid. Put on a low heat and bring to a simmer, the earlier in the day you do this, the better the stock will be. I like to simmer it for about 30 minutes then let it cool before heating again to pour into the bowls.
2. Place the egg in a small pan, cover with cold water and bring to the boil, once the water is boiling pull the egg out after 2 minutes, and let it cool, and you will find it easier to peel when the egg is cold.

When you are ready to serve:

1. Steam the peas and vegetables until they are tender. This should take no more than 5 minutes.
2. Reheat the broth.
3. Meanwhile, place the Ramen noodles in a large bowl and cover with boiling water, tease them apart after 4 minutes and put into the bottom of your Ramen Bowls.
4. Peel and cut the hardboiled egg in two and place on the noodles.
5. Arrange the vegetables over the top of the noodles.
6. Thinly slice the peppers and arrange over the vegetables.
7. Strain the broth into each Bowl.
8. Add a small sheet of Kombu.
9. Serve with a slice of lemon or live on the side.

Further Notes

I have seen people add 50 and even 100gr of Gochujang to the broth, now that’s going to blow your head off, but some like it hot. In the past, I have also added coconut milk, sweetcorn, green beans and even new potatoes.

Ivan Orkin swears by a roasted tomato as an umami bomb, who am I to disagree. Sometimes when I can’t make my mind up between curry or a bowl of Ramen, I combine the two, take out the Korean paste and pepper flakes and substitute with a good Curry paste and have a Poppadum on the side, now we are a long from a Japanese Shiro Ramen.

And finally, this is not authentic; it’s not an imitation, it’s just our family ramen recipe, nothing more needs to be read into it than that.