Kuai Tiao Neua - Thai Beef Noodle Soup

Being a noodle soup fanatic, I especially miss having good Pho and Kuai Tiao Neua (Thai beef noodle soup). Both the noodles and soup are light and refreshing, making a perfect 1 bowl meal on even the hottest summer day.

Yield:

Serves 4

Ingredients

1. For the Stock:
2. ==================
3. 2 lbs ox tail
4. 10 C water
5. 1 star anise
6. 1/2 tsp whole black peppercorns
7. 1 cinnamon stick
8. 4 cloves garlic
9. 1 knob of ginger sliced
10. small handful of cilantro roots/stems
11. 1 yellow onion peeled and quartered
12. 1 Tbs brown sugar (or more to taste)
13. 2 Tbs fish sauce
14. 1 tsp soy sauce
15. salt to taste
16. .
17. For the Bowl:
18. ==================
19. 8 oz rice “stick” noodles rehydrated in warm water
20. 6 beef balls (I like to make my own, but you can buy them at an asian grocery)
21. 1/4 sweet onion sliced thin
22. fried garlic chips & oil
23. Meicai (Hakka preserved vegetables) rehydrated and chopped.
24. 1 jalepeno pepper sliced
25. cilantro leaves
26. lime wedges

Directions

1. First, boil a large pot of water; add the ox tail and boil for about 7 minutes. What you’re trying to do here is to get all the foamy floaty stuff out of the oxtail so your soup comes out nice and clear. Dump this out through a strainer discarding the water, rinse the pot then thoroughly clean each piece of oxtail.
2. Add the cleaned ox tail and 10 cups of fresh water into the pot along with the star anise, peppercorns, cinnamon, garlic, ginger, cilantro stems/roots, and onion. Bring it to a boil then lower the heat to low, cover and simmer for 3-4 hours (the longer you go, the more depth your soup will have).
3. While you’re waiting you can make some garlic chips by mandolining a few garlic cloves then adding them to a few tablespoons of hot oil over medium heat. Stir to ensure even browning then remove to a paper towel lined plate when they reach a nice golden brown.
4. When it’s done, pass the soup through a strainer into another pot skimming off any excess oil. Season with the fish sauce, soy sauce, sugar and salt. I tend to go light on the salt as some of the condiments I add have some salt in them, but if you’re not planning on adding anything later, feel free to give it a bit more salt. Pick the meat off the bones and set aside.
5. To serve, boil a large pot of water, add the rehydrated rice noodles, stirring until the water comes to a boil again (about 1 minute). Meanwhile, reheat the beef balls in the soup. When the noodles are done, strain them through colander and add to the bowls. Top the noodles with some of the ox tail meat, onions, garlic chips, a bit of the garlic oil and Meicai. Laddle the hot soup and beef balls over the noodles then serve with the rest of the condiments. I also like having a little bowl of Sriracha and hoisin sauce to dip the meat in.

Notes

Gomamiso Yosenabe - Sesame Miso Hotpot

Nabe (pronounced nabeh) is the Japanese word for “pot” and is used to refer to a class of dishes which includes favourites such as shabu shabu and sukiyaki. Yose (pronounced yoseh) means to “put together”, so yosenabe is a dish that’s often cooked in a pot at the table with meat, seafood and veggies put together.Depending on what region of Japan you’re from, the broth can be made from seafood or meat and can be seasoned with miso, soy sauce or salt. All the regional combinations of items that go into nabes, makes it a very versatile dish that’s eaten all over Japan in winter. This is all just a long way of saying that there’s no right way to make a nabe.At its core, it’s a simple hearty stew that’s heavy on vegetables and light on meat. Because it’s typically cooked in a giant ceramic or cast iron pot at the table, it’s boiling hot when it reaches your bowl and is a great way to warm up during the cold months.While I’m no expert on all the regional variations of yosenabe (I doubt anyone could really keep track of all the variations), I’m fairly certain putting tahini into a nabe is pretty uncommon. It’s a weird quirk I have that started with a penchant for putting tahini in packaged ramens to give them a little more oomph. I love it because it gives the soup a white creaminess not unlike the rich pork broth used in tonkotsu ramen. The earthy flavors of are perfect compliments and the rich creaminess provides the stick-to-your-ribs feel without the stick-to-your-ribs calories.

Yield:

Serves 4-8

Ingredients

1. For the Stock
2. ================
3. 3 C dashi
4. 1/4 C miso
5. 2 Tbs mirin
6. 1 Tbs tahini
7. 1 tsp sugar
8. .
9. Root Vegetables (A):
10. ================
11. Carrots
12. Daikon
13. Potatao
14. .
15. Meats
16. ================
17. Chicken thighs cut into chunks
18. Pork sliced
19. Prawns
20. Fish cut it chunks
21. .
22. Green Vegetables (B)
23. ================
24. Ramps
25. Green Onions
26. Yellow Onions
27. Leek
28. .
29. Fungi
30. ================
31. Shiitake Mushrooms
32. Enoki Mushrooms
33. Matsutake Mushrooms
34. Shimeji Mushrooms
35. .
36. Other
37. ================
38. Shirataki
39. Tofu
40. .
41. Lettuces & Cabbages (C)
42. ================
43. Napa cabbage
44. Cabbage
45. Chrysanthemum
46. Spinach
47. Mizuna

Directions

1. In a medium cast iron pot, clay pot, or french oven (like a Le Creuset), add all the ingredients for the stock and whisk to combine. Heat over a table top burner or on the stove until simmering. Add a few items from veggie group A as well as any meat you want to add. After they’ve cooked, add some items from veggies group B, mushrooms, and other. When those are ready, finish by adding some veggies from group C.
2. Serve with an empty bowl and bowl of rice, keeping a ladle and long chopsticks at the table to pick out the bits each person wants.
3. It’s also common to finish the meal by adding a bowl of pre-cooked ramen, udon or rice into the left over stock after most of the veggies and meat have been eaten.

Notes

Before you balk at the long list of ingredients, you don’t need everything, just 1 or 2 from each category.

Sukiyaki

There are many styles of making this, but perhaps the most common way is to cook meat and veggies in a sweet soy sauce based broth at the table. While I’m a big fan of the table top cooking method (especially for Shabu Shabu), I actually prefer to pre-cook the stuff separately and just serve the sukiyaki in a large bowl in the center of the table.Regardless of how you decide to cook it, it makes for a really simple weeknight meal that requires no more than some washing and cutting of veggies. It’s typically made with thin slices of well marbled beef, but you could really use just about anything. Japanese markets tend to have the meat pre-sliced and packaged. I lucked out and got a pack of wagyu end-cuts (kiriotoshi) for a couple bucks. Because they were the end cuts the pieces were kinda irregular (which would be a problem for shabu shabu), but works just fine for sukiyaki. The most important thing is that the meat is tender and has a good amount of fat marbled with the meat.For veggies you can use just about anything. I went mostly traditional using Tofu, green onions, bamboo, enoki mushrooms, and chrysanthemum leaves, but I also added some fresh summer squash I got at the farmers market the other day. It’s a good way to clean out the vegetable drawer in your fridge.   Traditionally it’s eaten by dipping the cooked meat into a raw egg, but due to the potential for getting salmonella I wouldn’t recommend it. You could soft poach or coddle the egg, but I still don’t think that would technically be “safe”. Instead I just grate some raw yamaimo (japanese mountain yam) also known as nagaimo which has the texture and slimy consistency of a raw egg when grated. If all this talk of slimy things is turns you off, or you can’t find it, you could always just skip it.Leftover sukiyaki makes for a great bowl of udon (with some boiled noodles and egg cooked in the broth), or you could turn it into a donburi by reheating it with some beaten egg on top then serving it over a bowl of rice.

Yield:

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

1. thinly sliced well marbled beef
2. aromatic veggies (like onions, leeks, green onions, carrots etc)
3. other stuff (bamboo, tofu, shirataki noodles, etc)
4. mushrooms (shitake, shimeji, enoki, portobello, button, etc)
5. leafy veggies (like napa cabbage, chrysanthemum leaves, etc)
6. .
7. For the Broth:
8. ===============
9. 1/2 C dashi
10. 1/4 C mirin
11. 3 Tbs soy sauce
12. 2 Tbs dark brown sugar
13. .
14. To serve
15. =============
16. small bowl of yamaimo peeled and grated

Directions

1. =- For Table Top Cooking -=
2. If you’re cooking it at the table (I use a fondue pot), double or triple the recipe for the broth and mix all ingredients in the pot and heat. You’ll need enough broth to mostly submerge your food as you won’t get as much heat out of a fondue pot.
3. =- For Stove Top Cooking -=
4. If you’re cooking it on the stove, heat a pan on high until hot then add a bit of oil and sear the beef. You don’t want to cook it all the way through, just enough to brown the meat and get some fond on the pan. Transfer the meat to a plate and set aside.
5. Add the ingredients for the broth into the pan. There should be around 1/2″ of liquid in the bottom of the pan. Double the recipe if you need more. Start with the aromatic veggies then transfer to a serving bowl as they cook. Then move on the the “other stuff”, then the mushroom, then the leafy veggies, and finish by putting the beef into the stock until it’s cooked (careful not to overcook it). Dump the meat and broth over everything else and serve.

Notes

Brazilian Black Bean Stew

Here's a quick vegetarian version of the Brazilian national dish known as feijoada. This stew entices the eye with the colorful contrast of black beans and sweet potatoes and pleases the palate with nourishing ingredients.

Yield:

6 servings

Ingredients

1. 1 Tbs. vegetable oil
2. 1 large onion, chopped
3. 2 medium cloves garlic, minced
4. 2 medium sweet potatoes (1 to 1 1/4 lbs.), peeled and diced
5. 1 large red bell pepper, diced
6. 14.5-oz. can diced tomatoes
7. 1 small hot green chili pepper, or more to taste, minced
8. 2 (16-oz.) cans black beans, drained and rinsed
9. 1 ripe mango, pitted, peeled and diced
10. 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
11. 1/4 tsp. salt

Directions

1. Steam some Swiss chard while the stew is simmering and serve with warmed flour tortillas.
2. In large pot, heat oil over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring often, until softened, about 5 minutes. Stir in garlic and cook, stirring, until onion is golden, about 3 minutes.
3. Stir in sweet potatoes, bell pepper, tomatoes (with liquid), chili and 1 1/2 cups water. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover and simmer until potatoes are tender but still firm, 10 to 15 minutes.
4. Stir in beans and simmer gently, uncovered, until heated through, about 5 minutes. Stir in mango and cook until heated through, about 1 minute. Stir in cilantro and salt. Serve hot.

Notes

Lamb Tagine With Prunes And Cinnamon

This well-balanced stew is intense yet mellow. The prunes soak up the fragrant spices, and long, slow cooking turns the lamb fork-tender. View more of our favorite recipes from this issue.

Yield:

Serves 6

Ingredients

1. 2 1/2 lb boneless lamb shoulder, cut into 1 1/2-inch pieces
2. 1 medium red onion, halved and thinly sliced
3. 3 tablespoons plus 1/4 cup olive oil, divided
4. 3 (3-inch) cinnamon sticks
5. 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
6. 1 teaspoon ground ginger
7. 1 teaspoon turmeric
8. 1 pinch saffron threads
9. 1 tablespoon white wine or water
10. About 2 1/2 cups water
11. 1/2 lb prunes (about 2 cups)
12. 3 tablespoons mild honey
13. 1 tablespoon sesame seeds
14. 1/2 cup whole blanched almonds

Directions

1. Toss together lamb, onion, 3 tablespoons oil, spices (except saffron), 1 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper in a 5- to 6-quart heavy pot.
2. Lightly toast saffron in a dry small skillet (not nonstick) over medium heat until just fragrant, 15 to 30 seconds. Crumble into wine and let stand 1 minute. Add wine to pot, then add enough water to just cover lamb. Gently simmer, partially covered, stirring occasionally, 1 1/2 hours.
3. Stir in prunes and honey and simmer until meat is tender and sauce has thickened, 15 to 20 minutes. Season with salt.
4. Toast sesame seeds in dry small skillet over medium heat, stirring, until pale golden, then transfer to a small bowl.
5. Heat remaining 1/4 cup oil in same skillet over medium-high heat until it shimmers, then fry almonds until golden. Drain on paper towels.
6. Serve tagine sprinkled with sesame seeds and almonds.

Notes

Tagine can be cooked 1 day ahead and chilled (covered once cool). Reheat gently, thinning with water if needed.