Quick Pickles and Slow Poached Eggs: Soup, Momofuku-style

Soup is my favorite culinary medium. It's flexible, adaptable, comforting, and usually low maintenance. It's also a great way to clear some space in your refrigerator or use up the several pounds of potatoes that have inexplicably invaded your kitchen. But when you're feeling more adventurous, soup is also a great way to get creative. Hence this past week's culinary adventure: bacon miso soup over soba noodles with roasted chicken, shiitake mushrooms, greens, a slow poached egg and quick-pickled cucumbers and radishes.



I adore soups that require assembly just before eating. I have this thing about eating things out of a bowl; I went through a phase in college where I would grab random things from all over the dining hall and heap them into a bowl rather than onto a plate. I love soups that have lots of toppings, like Mexican tortilla soups with avocado and lime and big chunks of chicken, or Thai-style soups with onion, cilantro and chilies. While all-in-one-pot soups can be wonderfully easy and delicious, there's something super satisfying to me about keeping components separate and then combining them at the end in one ultra-happy bowl of goodness.

This soup was inspired - in no small way - by a cookbook I am currently reading called Momofuku (which means "lucky peach" in Japanese), which chronicles the rise and recipes of NYC's wonder-boy David Chang and his 4 (soon to be 5) restaurants under the Momofuku umbrella. The cookbook is very entertaining and definitely up my alley in the way it presents recipes; they start with the bases for dishes (broth, noodles, meat, sauce) and then show you how you can combine those things over and over again in new ways. David Chang also uses seasonal ingredients in many of his dishes, and likes to break tradition by combining flavors and ingredients historically from different cuisines and/or regions. The most famous dish from his first restaurant, Momofuku Noodle Bar, is Momofuku Ramen, and it was the main inspiration for this post's soup. I made a similar version of it recently with my culinary-mentor, Robert, but my version is different in a few crucial ways and I am very, very happy with how it turned out.

Another wonderful thing about soup is that there are always leftovers. And when you make a soup like this, which requires some assembly, it is really easy to change things up and try different toppings the second or third night you eat it. Although I was very happy the first night we ate this soup, it seemed there was a little something missing... Heat - as in spicy heat - would have been one way to fix it, but chili peppers aren't in season and I didn't have any spicy condiments on hand. Instead, I fried up some of the same wonderful local slab bacon I had used to make the broth and served it on the soup as a topping. I also crisped up the leftover chicken by throwing it in a hot pan with some of the bacon grease for a minute or two. The result was a smokier, richer flavor that really brought everything together.

Here's how the soup differed from night to night:

Night #1: Bacon Miso Broth over soba noodles with a roasted chicken, a slow poached egg, shiitake mushrooms, quick cucumber and radish pickles, chopped endive and bok choy tossed in octo vin, green onions, and crunchy rice topping.

Night #2: Same except no poached egg, added bacon, no endive and cooked the bok choy in the broth while it heated.

Night #3: Same as night #2 except no quick pickles, substituted kale for bok choy, and more bacon.
And each night it just got better and better!

I've broken down the recipe into separate components to make it easier to follow:



Slow Poached Eggs:
I love poached eggs, but I have not mastered the art of making them. The first time I tried I achieved a pot full of swirling hot egg white surrounding a yolk. This trick, while more time-consuming, makes the process more fool-proof and also achieves a remarkably soft, luscious poached egg. The idea is simple: heat a large pot of water slowly, until it is between 140 and 145 degrees F, and keep it there by adjusting the heat (you will need some sort of thermometer for this; digital is best, but I used an old-fashioned baker's thermometer). Use something - a colander insert, tin foil pouch, anything - to suspend the eggs in the water so that they aren't touching the bottom. Then simply place the eggs - still in their shells! - into the water and poach for 45 min, keeping the water temp constant. You may need to turn the heat completely off, or even add a couple of ice cubes if necessary. The end result is a lovely poached egg that you can crack right into your bowl at the table. They can also sit for a while and then be reheated slightly in a bowl of warm water.




Quick Pickled Cucumbers and Radishes:
These are my new favorite thing. Slice some cucumbers or radishes or both, toss them in a bowl with a 3:1 ratio of sugar to salt, and let stand for 10 minutes, and "voila!" You now have scrumptious, bright, tangy pickled veggies that are great eaten by themselves but also add a sweet and salty punch as a topping to other dishes (like this soup). Kirby cucumbers are best because they're firmer, but I think other cukes will work just fine. I used one medium Kirby cucumber and a handful of small radishes and added about a TB of sugar and a tsp of salt. Stir together and let stand 10 minutes. I also added a splash of rice vinegar at the end, just for fun (and flavor). These are incredibly yummy, and they were still incredibly yummy the following night.


Octo Vin:
This sauce is adapted from the Momofuku cookbook; it is good on pretty much anything! I didn't have chilis or any kind of chili/spicy product, but you can definitely add some to give this a 'kick'.

2 TB finely chopped garlic
2 TB chopped fresh ginger
1/4 cup rice vinegar
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 TB grapeseed or olive oil
1/4 tsp Asian sesame oil
1 1/2 TB sugar
black pepper

Mix ingredients together; toss a few TB's with some bitter greens and serve over soup or on the side...or simply spoon some onto the soup itself!



Bacon Miso Broth:
In Momofuku cookbook, the base for their ramen broth is a "Bacon Dashi," dashi being a traditional Japanese soup base normally made with katsuo-bushi (dried fish flakes), and the bacon being Chang's ingenious way of mimicking the smokiness of katsuo-bushi. I didn't have the time or resources to follow Chang's entire recipe for Ramen Broth, but I did borrow the bacon idea. I made my usual homemade chicken broth, but with Asian ingredients like ginger and green onions, and, of course, bacon. The bacon really went a long way, in a good way. But I had also bought some fresh red miso, so I went out on a limb and made bacon miso broth. The sweetness of the miso balanced the smokiness of the bacon.

3-4 quarts homemade or store-bought chicken broth
1 quart water
1 bunch green onions
2 TB ginger, roughly chopped
1/4 lb slab bacon
1/4 cup dried or fresh shiitake mushrooms
about 1 cup fresh miso, red or white (I used red)

Bring all ingredients to boil, reduce heat, simmer for 45 minutes, skimming fat/foam off the top every now and then. Remove bacon and large vegetables, strain broth through cheese cloth/fine mesh strainer. Place clarified broth back in pot, reheat; once hot, add miso, little by little, to taste. At this point you can add any mushrooms or greens that you want to be slightly cooked, for 10-20 minutes.



Momofuku-style Bowl of Goodness Miso Soup:

bacon broth (recipe above)
1 box soba or other Asian noodles, fresh or dried
1 chicken, whole or broken down
2 cups shiitake mushrooms
2 cups baby bok choy, Belgian endive, or other bitter green, chopped
smoked slab bacon
quick pickled cucumbers and radishes (recipe below)
octo vin sauce(recipe below)
2 slow poached eggs (1 per bowl)
green onion, white and green parts thinly sliced
puffed crunchy rice topping (for fun)

Start the water for slow-poached eggs. You will need a large pot, and you need to heat the water slowly. Once the water reaches 140 degrees F, follow the instructions above and poach for 45 minutes.

Brush chicken with sesame oil or olive oil, season with salt and pepper, and roast at 450 degrees (30-40 minutes for a broken down chicken, longer for a whole one). Carve into nice large chunks, with skin still on (skin should be crisp from high heat).

Make the octo vin sauce (recipe above). Refrigerate until needed.

You can either chop the mushrooms and greens and cook/heat in the finished broth for about 20 minutes or leave the greens raw and toss with octo vin sauce.

Fry the bacon in a skillet or in the oven until crisp, place in paper towel to drain grease, slice into 2 inch pieces.

Cook the soba or other noodles as directed on the package (if poached eggs are finished, bring the eggs' water to a boil and use to cook the noodles) It's fine if they sit and get cool because you will be pouring piping hot broth over them!

Slice the cucumber into 1/4 inch rounds, thinly slice the radishes, and toss with 1 TB sugar and 1 tsp salt. Let sit 10 minutes, then adjust seasoning as desired. Add a splash of rice vinegar if you like.

When everything is ready and broth is hot, arrange noodles, chicken and bacon in bowl, top with broth, crack in egg, top with any veggies, green onions, crunchy rice topping, etc., and drizzle with octo vin sauce. Then enjoy!


Happy Eating!

Pizza update and the best movie EVER...

It's bittersweet to remember the days when sleepovers with my best friend were a regular thing. Fact: our relationship is better than ever and we have the added advantage of seeing each other daily at our shared office. Fact: the reason(s) for fewer sleepovers are good reasons (like significant others, a cat named Fiona, a dog named Potato, and all the responsibilities that come with growing up). Fact: neither previous 'fact' can totally overcome my sense of loss (particularly since yet-to-be-determined factors on the road ahead -jobs and moves and babies - will make girls' nights with Beth fewer and further between.)

But that's life, and that's okay, and Friday night was good, clean fun.

To begin: the pizzas. Now, I have to admit up-front that the dough was not homemade. Friday night is not an ideal time to try your hand at pizza dough, in my opinion. But it was at least purchased in dough form, which is still world's away from most oven-ready pizza crusts. Not that there's anything wrong with ready-made crusts; they certainly help you avoid situations like finding yourself flinging a sticky, baguette-shaped, hole-filled rope of dough through the air...Admittedly the first crust didn't go quite as hoped, but thanks to Beth's ingenious "place on pan and squish into a circle" approach, we managed. The second crust worked like a charm.

The main focus of this meal was to use up an absurd amount of produce as quickly and creatively as possible. In order to have a no-male-zone without kicking our respective significant others out of our respective houses, our girls' night took place at my mom's house...just like old times! My mom's refrigerator was stuffed-to-bursting full of produce from Farm Fresh To You (a birthday gift I thought would be appropriate for a work-a-holic mother who can't always make time for the market). She had just rec her first box, filled with locally grown kale, potatoes, lettuce, leeks, carrots, a butternut squash, and - surprisingly - kiwi! Beth brought onion, green onion, cilantro, pine nuts and a yummy spicy peanut sauce. I brought the dough, the cheese, some frisee, and finally, the Lions' Mane mushrooms!



We chose two themes, and divided the ingredients accordingly: Pizza #1 was a fungi pizza with hearty, earthy fixings and goat cheese. Pizza #2 was a Thai-ish style pie with bright zippy veggies and a peanut sauce that packed a punch! Both turned out gorgeous, and both were nummy. As was the on-screen eye-candy. Cary Grant... Mmmmm. Jimmy Stewart...Siiiiigh. Katherine Hepburn in a flawless white gown-of-a-swimsuit-cover-up. Double-siiiiiiigh. If you haven't seen The Philadelphia Story, you need to. Not only does it have fabulous, funny and heartfelt performances and a great story/script, it also has the best and most endearing 'drunk' performance in the history of movie-dom, performed by Mr. Jimmy Stewart (and which earned him an Oscar, I might add!)



As Beth said - matter-of-factly after it was over - "That was the best movie. Ever."




Pizza #1: Funghi

1 ball of pizza dough
1-2 cups Lion's Mane or other assorted mild-flavor mushrooms
1/2 cups thinly sliced white or yellow onion
2 TB pine nuts
2-3 pieces thinly sliced prosciutto, pulled apart into bite-sized shreds
1 - 1.5 cups grated fontina or mozzarella cheese
2 -3 TB goat cheese
1/2 cup frisee greens, pulled into bite sized leaves and tossed w/ a little olive oil and salt
1 tsp olive oil
salt and pepper

Preheat oven as directed per the dough (ours was 450 degrees).

On floured work surface, stretch, roll and toss dough until a fairly uniform roundish shape is formed, about 18 in across.

Place on oiled baking sheet. Brush dough lightly with olive oil. Sprinkle grated cheese over surface. Then sprinkle on the onions, prosciutto, goat cheese, pine nuts and frisee, in that order. Season with salt and pepper, bake for about 15 minutes (or as directed by package).





Pizza #2: Thai Peanut

1 ball of pizza dough
1/4 cup thinly sliced carrots
1/4 cup chopped green onion, white and green parts
2-3 TB Peanut sauce (spicy is good!)
1 - 1.5 cups grated fontina or mozzarella cheese
2-3 TB chopped fresh cilantro
1 tsp olive oil
salt and pepper
1 avocado, thinly sliced
cilantro for garnish

Follow directions for Pizza #1. Once dough is ready on the pan, smear with peanut sauce. Sprinkle layer of cheese, then carrots, green onions and 1/2 of the cilantro. Sprinkle with the rest of the cheese and cilantro, season with salt and pepper, and bake as directed.

Garnish with cilantro and avocado, as desired.

Happy Eating!

Mid-Week Update: Overstocked!

Somehow this week I ended up with a ton of food in my kitchen, and no specific plans for any of it. Red potatoes, cauliflower, cod, spinach, fennel, tons of citrus, radishes, mushrooms, pancetta...I was suffering from a case of too many ingredients, which apparently I had bought on a whim. But I didn't panic; I took this as an opportunity to go shopping in my own refrigerator, and most of it worked out pretty well.

Non-fail dish #1: a mock-curry of diced red potatoes, yellow cauliflower, onion, ginger and yellow curry powder tossed with spinach and served over farro. It turned out to be a gorgeously yellow, texturally satisfying vegetarian dish with just enough smoky/spicy/sweetness for a curry. The next day I sent my boyfriend to work with the leftovers rolled up in a tortilla with a little cheese, and apparently it was yummmm.




Non-fail dish #2: spinach tossed with warm pancetta and mushrooms and a little mustard vinaigrette. Went nicely with the roasted fennel I made on the side. The only thing not so great was the cod I served it all with. While the huge filet of True Cod I bought from my sustainable fishmonger/butcher was gorgeous, the marinade recipe I found online was not. The citrus blend was too much, and the fennel seeds were WAY too much. Made for a pretty picture, especially before cooking...but not a pretty flavor in our mouths. Should have stuck to a simple olive oil and lemon approach. But anyway, lesson learned!




Way prettier before cooking...




Spinach, Pancetta and Warm Mushroom Salad (no photo)

Fry some diced pancetta in a frying pan over medium heat until slightly browned, about 7-10 min. Remove from pan, drain on paper towels.
Pour of half of the pan drippings, place pan back on heat and add a little olive oil or butter. Brown sliced mushrooms (I had Trumpet Royals) on medium heat, about 10-15 min. (As Julia Child would say, "Don't crowd the mushrooms!")
Toss pancetta and mushrooms w/ fresh spinach (in separate bowl; spinach gets too soggy if you do it in the pan) and a little balsamic vinaigrette. (2 TB balsamic vinegar, 1/4 cup olive oil, 1 TB whole grain mustard, salt and pepper...and I like to throw in a squirt of lemon)



Potato and Cauliflower Curry (sort of) with Spinach

1 lb baby red potatoes, boiled/microwaved until just tender, then quartered
1 large head "Cheddar" or other variety cauliflower, chopped into small florets
1/2 yellow onion, diced
1 2-inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and minced
Yellow curry powder
1/4 cup chicken broth
2 TB butter, 2 TB olive oil
Fresh baby spinach

Fry the cauliflower in 1/2 the oil and butter, until just tender but still snappy. Season with salt and pepper.
Heat rest of oil in medium saucepan, add butter when hot. Add onions and ginger, saute until onions are transparent, about 5 minutes. Add cauliflower, potatoes, and yellow curry powder. Toss everything together so that coated evenly with butter/curry powder. Add chicken broth, more curry powder if necessary, and salt and pepper. Cook until flavors blend and most of liquid evaporated, leaving vegetables sticky but not too soft, about 10-15 min. Cauliflower should still have snap.
Remove from heat, toss with spinach.

Serve over rice (or farro, like I did!) and garnish as desired.


Sneak Peak:



HOW CUTE ARE THESE LIONS MANE MUSHROOMS??? I can't wait to use them in something...I'll probably throw them on a pizza Friday. It's a girl's night and we're going to watch The Philadelphia Story and drink wine and giggle. Is there anything better than Katherine Hepburn and fungi pizza and red wine and a girl's night with your best friend? Unless it's all those things plus Cary Grant? And not to mention, Jimmy Stewart?

French Style...Omelets???

Today truly seemed like the first day of spring (CA spring, that is). Gorgeous sunshine, trees beginning to bud, and the sudden realization that after being closed up all winter my house is utterly filthy. So what better way to celebrate "spring" then by a wild scrubbing/sweeping/mopping frenzy? And what better to follow up a scrubbing/sweeping/mopping frenzy then an omelet brunch? Today I decided to try and learn omelets the "Julia Child" way. Growing up I learned to make them the slower, let-the-eggs-coagulate-over-moderate-heat, douse with cheese/tomatoes/avocado/mushrooms, etc, then flip one half over the other - way. And I learned to take them off soon enough so that they don't dry out and become leathery like the ones so many restaurants serve. And this, in my opinion, is still a great way to make them. And I am definitely NOT a fan of souffle-style omelets. BUT a few weeks ago I had my first properly executed simple French-style omelet (at one of our favorite brunch spots, Bette's Diner in Berkeley; I highly recommend their sour cream pancakes, their chicken sweet potato sausage - if they have it - and their bloody marys!), a simple herb and cheese one, and it was SOOO GOOOD. It didn't hurt that it was 2:00 and I had been climbing all morning and hadn't eaten a thing all day...but still. They are like soft scrambled eggs in a tight little package.



So I read the omelet section of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and then found this amazing video of Julia Child cooking omelets on "The French Chef." She's adorable. And she makes it look very very easy. And I thought it would be. And honestly, if I had had a truly non-stick pan, and not my overly-worn-out, scratched-up, probably-not-safe-to-be-used-anymore poor excuse for a pan (and yes, it's currently my ONLY frying pan...) then I might have been able to do it. I need a new one, but hey, good pan's are expensive. I'm going to have to practice the jerky motion that rolls the omelet over (my technique had too much 'flip' to it), and next time I think I need to turn up the heat even higher; but really, the sticking was the main problem.

That being said, although my result wasn't as pretty as Julia's, it was soft, perfectly done, and delicious. It just didn't stick together like it was supposed to; it was like a cross between an omelet and soft-scrambled eggs. I threw some fresh parsley in with the eggs - and not just any parsley, but parsley I started growing last spring, trimmed back last fall, and which continued to produce small parsley leaves throughout the winter and is NOW all of a sudden going strong again. Amazing. Apparently parsley can survive on cold, hard neglect.



I also added a sprinkling of sharp cheddar cheese (none of that yellow/orange stuff, thank you), some chopped chives, and served it with a clementine tangerine, some sliced avocado (amazingly there are still some CA avocados at my market; most come from far away this time of year) and yummy toasted Crankin loaf - toasted - from Feel Good Bakery.

Although it didn't quite go as planned the first time, I'm definitely going to hone this technique. It makes omelets SO quick and easy. But I will not be posting the video David took of me making omelets today. I'll leave it to your imagination. (hint: that point in Julia's video where the eggs magically held together as she swirled and then jerked the pan? Yeah, that didn't happen. I had to push it all together with a spatula. Huh.)



French Style Herb and Cheese Omelet
(Adapted from Mastering The Art of French Cooking)

2-3 eggs
1 TB of fresh chopped herbs (I used parsley)
1-2 TB of lightly grated sharp cheddar or other cheese
1 TB of butter
salt & pepper
chopped chives for garnish



Beat together eggs, herbs, salt and pepper until whites and yolks just mixed.
Have cheese, chives, and any other garnishes ready.

Heat pan on high heat; add 1 TB of butter - it should bubble immediately - and wait until foam has just subsided. Then add eggs. Let sit for 2-3 seconds; eggs should be bubbling and forming one mass.

Throw on your cheese - if you choose - and then quickly swirl eggs together once or twice; then jerk the pan, hard, towards you, several times, forcing the omelet to turn over on itself. Turn pan upside down onto plate, leaving omelet bottom-up on the plate. Garnish and serve.

(I suggest watching the video I linked above...it's very helpful!)


~Happy Eating~

Mid-Week Update: Potage Parmentier

Tonight we had planned to head to the gym after work, so a mid-week recipe post did not seem all that likely. But the highway was so backed up and the weather so crummy...we turned right around and headed to our market. With leftover cream at home and a gloomy weather forecast, something 'not-low-fat' and comforting was in the cards. As it happens, this week I received my copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking Volume I, and the very first recipe is "Potage Parmentier," or "Leek/Onion and Potato Soup." All I really needed to buy was potatoes and leeks. But I had a feeling that I would end up straying from the recipe, so I also bought oyster and maitake mushrooms and sustainably caught petrale sole (all from local sources). I didn't have a clear idea of what I would do with these ingredients...but sometimes that's half the fun!

I may have committed a culinary sin by straying from Julia Child's recipe. But I was tired, and rushed, and feeling very anti-directions-ish; so I threw some water in a pot, threw the prepped leeks and potatoes after it, and then just started adding/adjusting as I went. I also discovered that I still had an ENTIRE large tupperware full of leftover potatoes and kale, so I quickly decided to make that into a soup as well. It was definitely a night for experimentation. I tossed the leftovers, (potatoes, kale, onions) into a pot with some chicken stock and water and simmered it for a while, then added salt and a splash of white wine. Then I removed it from the heat and pureed until smooth with my emersion blender. The result was not pretty by any means (the purple potatoes and kale turned it a rather bleak shade of beige), and was rather thick; but it was really quite yummy once I added enough salt. I'm saving it - maybe even freezing it - and will figure out something to do with it later.



Not very pretty...


My REAL potato soup turned out wonderfully golden and thin and mild, a lovely base for something else. It probably should have been thicker, but I liked this in-between thick and thin state. Once the soup was ready, I finally turned to my mushrooms and sole; I cooked them together in a pan with butter and olive oil. I figured we'd have mushrooms in our soup with a random side'o'sole. But when they were ready I was suddenly inspired to taste the fish with the soup, and voila!, I had made a 'bisque!' Sometimes the best cooking experiences are full of surprises.
















Potage Parmentier a la Jasmine

10 Yukon gold potatoes, peeled & quartered
1 1/2 quarts water (this can vary)
1/2 quart chicken stock (optional...or use more!)
2-3 lbs leeks, white & light green parts, cut into thin rounds
2-4 TB butter 1-2 cups heavy cream (this can also vary)
splash of white wine (optional)
shaved parmesan cheese, to taste or just as garnish
plenty of salt (very important!)

Bring the water to boil, add potatoes and leeks, simmer until starting to soften (30-45 min).

Add broth, wine, and salt. Cook until potatoes falling apart (10-14 min more).

Add cream and parmesan; using hand held emersion blender or regular blender, puree until smooth. Adjust flavor/texture as needed by adding more cream, butter, parmesan, chicken stock, salt.
Top w/ chopped parsley.


















Potato Leek & Sole Bisque w/ Mushrooms

Potage Parmentier (from recipe above)
2 small petrale sole fillets, sprinkled w/ olive oil, salt and pepper, and lemon
1 cup mixed mushrooms (I used oyster and maitake), chopped

Cook the mushrooms in 1 TB butter over medium heat, 10 min, until soft and starting to brown. Push to edges of pan, put the fillets in the center, cook for 2-3 minutes per side, until white and flaky.

Remove from heat, break fish into small chunks, split fish and mushrooms between 2 bowls. Pour in soup, top w/ parsley and parmesan.





Next time, I will follow Julia's recipe to a 'T', I swear...but this is NOT Julie and Julia here people, and sometimes I just need to play!

~Happy eating~