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Noodle Soup

This Asian-inspired soup is a comforting and delicious dish that you can eat for breakfast, lunch or dinner. If you don't have the time or the inclination to make the broth, use a vegetable stock cube to make the broth instead. There are plenty of vegetables in those too.
Servings: 0

Ingredients

To make the broth

  • 3 litres Water
  • 3 Carrots
  • 2 Onions
  • 4 ribs Celery
  • 1 Leek cleaned, with the tough parts of the green leaves removed
  • Black pepper corns
  • 80 f Ginger fresh, peeled
  • 2 Star anise if you hate this, just leave it out
  • 2 Cloves
  • 1/2 Cinnamon
  • pinch Salt a good pinch

For the soup

  • 10 Mushrooms Ideally use dry shitake mushrooms, soaked in water for at least an hour. If you don't have these, you can use fresh mushrooms or another kind of dry mushroom.
  • 6-8 bunches Bean thread noodles Also called "glass noodles" these are not made of rice (read the package to make sure). Use one bundle of noodles per person.
  • 1 bunch Coriander Remove the stalks and save them to make a green soup or a different broth. You can freeze them for this purpose.
  • 3 Tbs Thai fish sauce
  • 1 head Lettuce Romain/Kos or Iceberg. Sliced thinly.
  • 3 Spring Onions Green and white parts, sliced thinly.
  • 3-4 Chiles Little, red, hot ones by preference, but less spicy if that's better for you. Slice these up and place them on a bowl on the table as an optional garnish.
  • 3-4 Limes Quartered and place in a bowl on the table for people to squeeze over their soup.

Instructions

Make the broth

  • Place all the broth ingredients in a big saucepan and bring to a boil.  Simmer for 2 hours.  You can use a pressure cooker for this, in which case, cook for 30 minutes.

Prepare the soup ingredients

  • While the soup is cooking, soak the shitake mushooms in just enough cold water to cover them. When they are soft (this could take an hour) squeeze them out over the bowl in which they were soaking and reserve this liquid to add to the soup. Slice these thinly and pop them in a bowl.
  • Soak the bean thread noodles in plenty of cold water.
  • Finely slice the lettuce and spring onions and pop them in different bowls.

Put the soup together

  • Drain the broth through a colander or sieve -retain the liquid!!! - and throw away the contents of the colander. Return the broth to the pan and put it back on low heat.
  • Add the mushroom soaking water, the mushrooms, and the fish sauce to the pan. Simmer gently.
  • Bring a large pan of water to the boil. Drain the soaking noodles and add them to the pan of boiling water. Cook them for 30 seconds only. During this 30 seconds, place the serving bowls on the counter., ready to fill with your soup.
  • Drain the noodles and then divide them between the bowls. Divide the lettuce, coriander, and the spring onions between the bowls, on top of the lettuce. Ladle over the soup and serve at once.
  • Individuals can add chiles and a squeeze of lime if they like.
  • Using both a spoon and chop sticks, stir up the soup, mixing all the ingredients together, and slurp it up.