Asian Noodle Soups--Cook-Off 18

[aznsailorboi]

I LIKE FAT!!!!! ok marbled is good too, i think thinly sliced marbled meat would be perfect...thats how i choose meat for pho. lean beef slices are just too healthy for me.... but kidding aside, IMO lean beef slices would still be tender as long as its thinly sliced, and since its only being blanched I doubt the scalding soup can overcook it.

[aznsailorboi]

I think I'm gonna make another asian noodle soup tonight.... this I haven't tried yet, Its Gari Ga, its Vietnamese chicken curry soup with bun, I got the recipe from my roomate's mom when I went home with him for Thanksgiving.....but I also want to make something I havn't heard of yet.

[Jason Perlow]

[...]I've done some reading that says it's only "real" Sriracha if it was produced in the Sriracha region of Thailand.  The bottle I had prior to this one was from Thailand and delicious.  I haven't tasted this kind, from the US yet, but I am expecting that a Thai person might not think it is Sriracha sauce.[...]

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Susan, pho is a Vietnamese soup, not a Thai soup, and every Vietnamese restaurant I've been to in New York prominently displays Huy Fong brand Sriracha on the table, so if it's good enough for all the Vietnamese-New Yorkers, it just might be good enough for you.

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I've had both the Huy Fong "cock" Sriracha (made in California using domestically grown chiles) and also the "Gull" brand Sriracha (made in Vietnam). Personally, I prefer the Huy Fong, because I think they use more garlic, is one of the hottest ones I've had, and it has less sugar in it. As Michael says, the Huy Fong is pretty much univeral in the Vietnamese restaurants in the NY Metro Area and also in California.

http://www.huyfong.com/frames/index.htm

http://importfood.com/sriracha_sauce.html

"Sriracha" as I understand is a generic term for this type of sauce, so the issue of genuine versus non-genuine is pretty murky. However, a while ago the Huy Fong sauce was being counterfeited:

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=65948

[Marco_Polo]

Had the pho bo last night.

Nice bowl, Chris. Looks really friggin' fantastic (says he, just back from Italian wine tasting and hungry enough to eat the house...). Going to have to try this real soon.

MP

[purplewiz]

I've been wanting to make the Asian Salmon Laksa from Ainsley Harriott's Gourmet Express II ever since I was given the book, and this cook off was the perfect excuse to finally get it all together.

I don't know about authenticity, but the soup was pretty good. It's salmon strips and bok choy in a coconut curry broth with lemon grass, shallots, ginger, and garlic, poured over rice noodles. The salmon is marinated in lime juice before cooking.

I admit to monkeying with the proportions, reducing the amount of noodles and increasing the amount of bok choy, to make the dish fit into our eating plan better. I also took the liberty of garnishing with chopped cilantro and some red pepper flakes, since the red Asian chili peppers that the recipe called for are scarcer than hen's teeth in this town.

I liked the basic flavors, but it lacked oomph, so I ended up squeezing lime juice over each serving - which was perfect, it was exactly that it needed.

Marcia.

[anzu]

Had the pho bo last night. Does anyone know if the bo is pronounced like the pho? Fuh buh or fuh boh?

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Bo is pronounced more like the boh ofyour transcription. Aim for the 'or' sound in a word like 'morning' and you'll be close.

[OnigiriFB]

Wow everyone has done an awesome job of asian soups. I haven't forgotten about this cook off just been a bit too busy to make anything lately. I'm still tossing ideas around about what to make. So far I've narrowed it down to three different Thai noodle dishes. Hopefully next week will be less hectic and I can make it down to the asian store. Good job everyone!

[Chufi]

Finally time for some noodlesoup tonight.

I did not follow a recipe, but just put some things together I had in the house.. and some shrimp, tofy and coconutmilk I picked up on the way home.

here's what I did: fried some shallots, garlic, ginger and chili in a little oil. Poured some really good-flavoured chickenstock I had in the freezer, and half a can of cocnut milk. Added some limeleaves and fishsauce, and left it to simmer for about half an hour.

In the meantime, I marinated some cubes of tofu in sambal brandal and soysauce. Then fried over high heat.. these were so good.. I should have made more!

Heated up shrimp and baby bokchoy in the broth. Ladled it over noodles (bought in my chinese supermarket, they are labelled Ho Fan wheat noodles).

Garnished with beansprouts, coriander, chili, some raw bokchoy and the tofu.

I don't know what this was, but I hope it's Asian enough for the cook-off. The flavour was fantastic!

[Pan]

Klary, what's sambal brandal? A Dutch name for sambal belacan/terasi (shrimp paste with hot pepper), perhaps?

Edited January 28, 2006 by Pan (log)

[miladyinsanity]

There you go.

This is rice vermicelli in pig's stomach soup with a chicken drumstick. Not a very appetizing picture, I know, but the soup is good!

I'll endeavour to get better pictures when I talk my mom into making Penang-style prawn noodles.

[Chufi]

Klary, what's sambal brandal? A Dutch name for sambal belacan/terasi (shrimp paste with hot pepper), perhaps?

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I don't know what the word brandal means, it's not Dutch, I always assumed it was Indonesian. 'Sambal' is sort of synonomous with chilipaste over here (I know that's not what it means) , and you can buy all sorts of different ones. I currently have in my fridge:

sambal oelek, chilipaste from raw chilipeppers,

sambal djeroek, chilipaste with limejuice and limeleaves,

sambal brandal, this is a fried paste of chilipepers, sugar and terasi.

sambal peteh, chilipaste with peteh beans

I like the fried sambals because they are less hot but have (in my opinion) more flavor.

[sanrensho]

Made khao soi today, as detailed in the Khao Soi Battle thread.

Wonderful stuff. This will be a regular dish for us. Our 7-year old was even stealing bits of food from my bowl (the kids had padh si yeuw), and the 4-year old also had a few bites without complaint. This was a pleasant surprise as I didn't think they could handle the heat.

[pork]

I made pho last night but regrettably did not take pictures!

[Jason Perlow]

Tonight we decided to make a traditonal-style Chinese soup stock using the leftover duck carcasses from last night's annual Chinese New Year Celebration.

The soup itself was a combination of the picked over peking ducks, simmered into stock overnight, with chicken stock added to balance out the strong flavor. Leftover frozen char siu was cooked to death in the broth to render out all their flavor (in lieu of Chinese ham) along with ginger, garlic, black peppercorns, sichuan peppercorn, shitakke mushroom stalks (the caps all prepped for tomorrow's dinner) and a big bunch of cilantro and scallions. After simmering this for a while, everything was strained out to yeild a very strong Chinese soup stock. We didnt bother trying to clarify this since for it was for home consumption.

To make the finished soup we added Shanghai Bokchoy, Spinach, shrimp, fresh cilantro, mungbean sprouts, and some kickass storebought char siu I bought today. And of course, the fresh Wonton Skin Noodles, and a hit of sesame oil. And a few drops of Maggi Seasoning (The Taste of Asia!). Hey, there ain't no substitute for MSG.

Fresh Char Siu, threatened with early consumption. Good thing I bought 2lbs of it!

The finished soup in the pot.

Plated portion.

[lesfen]

Jason, you are the king of food porn.

[Jason Perlow]

Just call me the Larry Flynt of online food photography. We both have the same taste in closeup shots. Although, come to think of it, Bob Guccione was probably much more of a foodie than Larry is. Unfortunately, after a life of hard living, Bob is eating through a tube now.

[angrykoala]

[Rachel Perlow]

The key to last night's soup was restraint. If you compare with our previous effort from last week (link), we put less "stuff" into the soup. It's much better that way.

[Malawry]

I just made my first-ever Asian noodle soup tonight, basing my technique off of Ellencho's recipe in RecipeGullet. I used beef neck bones that were cheap at the Asian market instead of the much-more-expensive oxtails, plus charred ginger and onion and toasted star anise and cinnamon to make the stock. Thanks to blanching and cleaning the bones and using my trusty chinois, the stock was very clear and aromatic. I spiked it with fish sauce, a little soy sauce and some sriracha.

Then we fixed bowls with shiitake mushrooms, some seasoned tofu I found, thin-sliced round steak, Shanghai cabbage, scallions, cilantro and some fresh udon. Poured in the boiling broth. Seasoned at the table with more soy sauce and sriracha. It was pretty good! Next time, though, I'll marinate the beef in advance...it did not pick up much flavor from the hot broth. Actually I marinated the leftover beef and will try some leftovers tomorrow to see if the beef has improved flavor.

I'm not gonna need much of this udon for the soup. Any suggestions for how to use up the rest of it? Will it work well in a noodle stir-fry? Will stir-frying it be enough, or do I need to soften it in some water or broth beforehand? It was a little too chewy in the soup even though the noodles were fresh--they are very stiff when cold. Can I do something with it to improve it in the leftover soup tomorrow? The label says it's ready-to-use which was why I just added it to the bowl and then poured the hot broth over.

[tejon]

Tonight we had kuksu, curtosy of Marco_Polo's generous directions and images. The broth came out deep and rich, made even better with the contrast of fresh vegetables. I'll definitely be making this again!

[Marco_Polo]

Tonight we had kuksu...

Great job, Kathy, that looks really delicious and just the right balance of toppings to soup and noodles. My grandmother would approve! I too love the contrast of the deeply flavoured and rich with the fresh and crunchy.

Marc

[torakris]

Tonight we had kuksu, curtosy of Marco_Polo's generous directions and images. The broth came out deep and rich, made even better with the contrast of fresh vegetables. I'll definitely be making this again!

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Kathy,

What kind of noodles did you use?

[tejon]

I used Korean vermicelli, which appear to be pretty much identical to somen. These happened to be a little bit cheaper at the local asian market, but somen noodles would work just as well.

[Shalmanese]

Coming rather late into this cookoff:

Miso-Noodle Soup with Tofu and Shittake Mushrooms

Perfect for when it's grey and drizzly outside and you feel like shit.

[spaghetttti]

Yikes!! I've got my head on backwards today, and I'm crossposting to the Dinner! thread (where there are more photos and descriptions), when I should've posted here!

Soto Ayam