Ramen 1.0
The Idea
My biggest binge-watching show lately isn’t the usual show that keeps people hooked. Lately, the show that has captured my attention is Chef’s Table. The show basically features a chef that usually has a Michelin star, and most often owns one of the top restaurants in the world. The show talks about their culinary journey, and their path to being a master of their craft. A lot of the chefs tend to cook with a French-style or focus on tasting menus. Sometimes the show goes somewhere different like a Ramen shop in New York City. This particular episode features Ivan Orkin who after opening a successful ramen shop in Tokyo, which is pretty amazing for a white Jewish guy from NYC. He then eventually opens two ramen shops in NYC. The biggest takeaway from this episode was how he actually makes his own noodles, which even the fancier ramen joints usually just use premade noodles.
Now I am a huge fan of Ramen, and when I was in the Navy consumed many bags of 9 cent Top Ramen and Cup of Noodles. If not for Ramen and readily available PB&J sandwiches I might have gone without meals. I think for me Ramen can be whatever you want it to be. It can simply be noodles with a broth made of water and a spice packet or it can be multiple types of stocks with the addition of an unlimited combination of ingredients. There doesn’t seem to be any right or wrong way to make ramen, and it is completely up to the ramen consumer. I decided for my ramen that I would keep it somewhat tame focusing more on the noodle creation and broth.
The Process
For the broth, I decided to go with a beef broth. In our household, we try to do our part to obtain our meats from ethical and sustainable sources. We enjoy venison when we can acquire it from friends and family, and we purchase pork and beef from a local farm Powers Farm. Not only does this support local farms and allows us to do our part to get away from factory farming, but it’s also honestly just better tasting meat. From our last cow, we purchased I had a bag of beef bones that I had previously roasted in the oven and then cooked in the Instant Pot for around 3 hours. Normally when making stock you would also include vegetables, but I didn’t want to take away too much from the beef bones themself. After the stock was finished I put it in a covered container overnight to allow the fat to settle to the top. Once it cools you can basically lift the fat off like a giant disk or use a spoon to scoop it off. I was then able to warm up the broth on the stovetop and I seasoned it with a combination of soy sauce, fish sauce, and mirin. The mirin gives it a nice subtle sweetness and the soy and fish sauce add their own unique salt profile to the broth. I find the fish sauce also gives it a unique aroma that to some might be a bit overpowering, but I enjoy the unique flavor/aroma combination.
For the noodles, I used a simple recipe using all-purpose flour. I then used my stand mixer’s pasta sheet attachment combined with the spaghetti attachment to quickly cut my noodles. As the noodles cames out of the noodle maker it was an easy step to coat and toss them in extra flour to prevent sticking. To actually cook them it simply required a few minutes in boiling water.
All that was left was what additions I would make to the ramen. I knew that I had to at least have an egg. I think the egg might have to be the one constant in ramen. My plan was to soft-boil eggs in the instant pot. What I failed to realize is that this is more of a trial and error to master. If the eggs are pulled out a minute too early they end up undercooked. If the eggs are pulled out a minute too late they end up hard-boiled. The idea with a soft-boiled egg is that the egg white is fully cooked and firm, while the yolk is still relatively runny. For my eggs I wanted the yolk to be an almost medium where the yolk was overly running but still keeps the flavor of an uncooked yolk. Traditionally after soft-boiling, the eggs would then be marinated in some sort of soy/mirin combination that I’ll leave for my next attempt. My eggs ended up overcooked of course after nine minutes in the instant pot according to the instructions. I believe part of the issue was that I didn’t do an immediate quick release after the 9 minutes of pressure cooking. So while not ideal I at least had my eggs. I decided to completely leave out any extra meat for this attempt. I really wanted to see what I could do with just the broth itself. On my next attempt, I would like to use either roast pork or a pork belly (If I can find one). I ended up deciding on spinach and green onion. I think the texture of the green onion adds something different to ramen and adds even more to the aroma while the spinach gives its own unique texture to the dish.
Lessons Learned
I believe overall this was a successful attempt. I kept it simple so as to make the broth the focus of the dish. On my next attempt, I would like to experiment with multiple stocks and add in meat such as pork belly, roast pork, beef, chicken thighs, or perhaps experiment with tofu. The eggs will need some work as I would like to be able to master soft boiling eggs as well as pre-marinating the eggs. I also completely eliminated all garlic from this attempt completely on accident. It is almost sinful for me to forget garlic, but there will be time for redemption. The noodles turned out mediocre in taste, while the texture was spot on. I plan using a few different types of flour on the next attempt. Ivan Orkin, who I mentioned before, uses a multitude of flours including rye flour which I find interesting. As I mentioned before, it turned out to be a successful first attempt, but as in all good experiments, there are always lessons to be learned.
The Recipes
Useful Gadgets
…being a kitchen nerd I like to have the most efficient tools for the job.
For this recipe, there aren’t any must-haves necessarily. All of this can be done with conventional methods, however, being a kitchen nerd I like to have the most efficient tools for the job. I have included Amazon Associate links for everything below. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
For the stock, an instant pot will cut the time for making stock down by a significant portion. It’s probably one of the most useful tools in my kitchen and eliminated the need for me to have a stovetop pressure cooker and a standard slow cooker/crockpot.
While you’re buying an instant pot save yourself the time and get the non-stick insert as well. I typically use this insert unless I’m using the instant pot to sear. It’s not only nice to have two inserts to eliminate the need for washing in between cooking multiple components of a dish, but it prevents sticking for obvious reasons.
A stand mixer is a great item to have in the kitchen for many reasons. It doesn’t eliminate hand blending completely, but for most recipes, it eliminates so much unnecessary stress from hand mixing. There are multiple sizes, and multiple types from tilt head to bowl lift. I recommend going big or going home based on your budget. I started out with a small mixer originally and finally ended up with a 6 quart.
The last items can be used with the stand mixer as attachments. These are the pasta sheet maker and the spaghetti cutter. These two items make any noodle-making effortless.
