noodle – Goboroot.com

Lately, I have been enjoying doing old things. It seems like I’m against the current of modern technology of this day and age, but it just feels right in my own skin. Having started shooting using film is one of them. I truly enjoy the process of taking a photograph. Everything slows down. Unwrap a roll film. Load it and wind it on a spool, wind again to finally be able to shoot. It’s peaceful. Carefully choose a subject and think about a composition, so as not to waste one precious shot out of 10. Now decide on the aperture, take light metering and settle on the shutter speed. Concentrate. Focus. Duh, take off the darkslide, which I often forget to remove! Wait for the right moment. Press the shutter, hoping that neither my subject, nor I, have moved a mere inch. “Dung,” the heavy sound of mirror movement and shutter action completes all that it takes to photograph one scene, and that excites me very much. And yet, I won’t know if I managed to come away with the shot until the film is developed. I have become patient. Cock the shutter, advance the film and start all over again. I get indescribably giddy.

So going back to the old things, for this post, I made udon noodles for you in the traditional way that some Japanese people still do. It is a time consuming process, but if you are looking for something to clear your mind or are trying to settle your anxiety, or if you are like me, just like to use your hands to make food, it is like a type of meditation. At least, the result is certainly worthy: a warm, utterly satisfying bowl of noodle soup.

Udon Noodles and Soothing Soup

Feeds 8 – 10 people

1 kg all purpose flour

Salted water (50g salt and 450 g water)

Cornstarch for rolling the dough

Topping

Green onions, scallions or chives, finely sliced

Soup (serves 3-4)

2 x Kombu (about 4 x 4 inch pieces), make some slits in it with kitchen scissors

2 cups bonito flakes

5 tablespoons mirin

5 tablespoons light coloured soy sauce (usukuchi soy sauce)

or Soba sauce (see the recipe)

Sea salt

Dissolve salt well in 450g of water. Place the flour in a large bowl and add the salted water. Combine until there is no dry flour left. Form into a ball.

Place the dough in between two sheets of clean plastic sheets or Saranwrap on a sheet of clean cloth on the floor (yes, the floor!). Step on the dough with your clean feet. Fold it, step on it to stretch it and fold again. Repeat until the dough becomes smooth. Try not to let the air get inside the dough when you are folding. Match the corners neatly while folding so that it becomes a tidy small mass. Form into a ball.

Rest the dough in an airtight bag (or wrap tightly) at room temperature, 1 hour in summer time or 2 to 3 hours in winter.

In the meantime, make dashi stock. Wipe and clean the piece of kombu with a wrung wet cloth. Do not wash, as flavour leaches away. Fill a large pot with 1.5 L of water and place the kombu inside. Let sit for 20 minutes to let umami leach into the water.

Warm up the pot over medium heat and, just before water starts boiling, remove the kombu from the pot. Don’t cook the kombu, as it gives off an unpleasant odor and taste.

Add the bonito flakes and bring to a boil very briefly: remove from heat. Do not boil the bonito, as it also makes the dashi unpleasant to taste. Leave the dashi until the bonito has sunk to the bottom of the pot and infused the stock. Strain the dashi stock into another pot. Warm up, and add mirin and soy sauce. Adjust with salt. Or, if you already have the soba sauce made, you can add 8 to 10 tablespoons of it. Just gradually add and taste to achieve your liking, and then adjust with salt. If you have extra, keep it refrigerated for up to a few days.

Step on the dough once again in between the two sheets of plastic, and form into a circle. Use your weight to stretch the dough as wide as possible, making it easier to stretch farther later. Flour the cornstarch on the working table and transfer the dough. Using a rolling pin, stretch the dough to about a 27-inch circle. Try to make the dough evenly thick. You can either form it into a circle or square. If you make the dough into a square shape, all the noodles become the same length when you cut them. Alternatively, if you find the dough too tough to stretch with a rolling pin, you can use a pasta attachment on a stand mixer to stretch it. Make the dough into about ¼ inch thickness.

Scatter the cornstarch on the dough surface and fold in thirds; just like you fold a letter to fit in an envelope, pull an edge from one side to the centre and another from the other edge to the centre, overlapping. Cut into ¼ inch thickness with a sharp knife. The key is to match the width of the noodle with the thickness of the dough to make nice shapes. As you cut, fluff the noodles to prevent them from sticking to each other. If you don’t want to cook all the noodles, you can divide them into smaller portions and freeze in airtight bags (remove the air as much as possible so as to avoid freezer burn). Consume within 2 months for the best flavour.

Boil water in a large pot. You need about 5 L of water to cook 400g of noodles per 3 people. Cook the noodles until done, for 12 to 13 minutes. The thicker the longer it takes to cook, so if you are not sure about the doneness, cut a piece of cooked noodle and see if the centre part became translucent. Adjust the heat accordingly to avoid spilling the hot water.

Drain the noodles and rinse with cold water. Drain completely and serve a portion in each bowl. Pour the hot soup over the noodles and top with green onions.

“Itadakimasu.”

It is still too early to plant any vegetables here in the Vancouver region due to the amount of rain we receive during winter months plus the threat of unexpected cold spells in April. Nonetheless, part of my garden is slowly being transformed by a green carpet of corn salad (Valerianalla locusta). Although unknown by many, corn salad is a vegetable that we urban gardeners enjoy especially during early spring when there is not much to eat in a garden. Corn salad, aka lamb’s lettuce, is a cold hardy plant that has small, tender green leaves that possess a mild and somewhat nutty flavour. These are perhaps the only salad leaves you can harvest without any care at all in the winter season! Yet, corn salad is special because it feeds us when we are really in need, around February to April. It requires no fuss, no cover and it self seeds comfortably every year and still looks happy in the dead of winter. As a matter of fact, I just sowed the seeds two years ago and they have kept faithfully coming back since then.

Whenever I crave a quick, fresh, savoury meal, I turn to a soba salad; a cold soba dish with seasonal vegetables. Soba is a Japanese staple, and is also called buckwheat noodles in North America. It is composed of a mixture of white flour, buckwheat flour and water. Making the noodles requires an intricate craftsmanship, so I buy dried ones. Soba salad is so easy to make and light to eat as even a late night meal. I remember one of my uncles used to eat this dish every day just before going to boxing practice! He always said it fulfilled his stomach long enough yet still gave him a quick boost of energy before exercising. The contentment you feel after eating this dish is incomparable to any other light quick meals, for me at least! The key is to have dry soba and a bottle of aged soba sauce handy. Add baby salad leaves, like corn salad with its vibrant green colour, in order to make a springy plate, perfect for potlucks too! So far all my friends loved this dish for its freshness, textures, flavour and aesthetics.

I will introduce a sauce recipe that I learned when I worked in a kitchen in Shinjuku in my first year of college days. To this day, I still cherish this recipe for its versatility. It is called hongaeshi, but I call it soba sauce so that my friends can pronounce it with ease. It is slightly thick liquid made with mirin, sugar and soy sauce that is simmered and cooled, then left to sit for at least two weeks in the refrigerator. The longer it sits, the better and the richer the flavour becomes, and the more roundness and umami are produced.

Some traditional artisanal noodle restaurants in Japan inherit a secret sauce recipe of this kind that has been passed from generation to generation. Yet, some restaurants let the sauce mature for years in order to obtain a premium quality. Although you can pick up a bottle of mentsuyu at your local Japanese grocery store, I prefer to make my own for the enhanced flavour and to ensure better quality. It is indeed a great multipurpose Japanese condiment for noodle dishes, soup, stir-fry, braising and the list goes on! I always make a big batch so that it lasts me for a long time.

If you feel like a warm bowl of soba or udon noodles, make soup (mentsuyu) by adding the sauce to dashi stock or water to reach the preferred taste, and bring to a boil. Then, add the cooked and drained (but not rinsed with cold water) noodles to the soup.

Soba Sauce (hongaeshi)

Makes 1 litre

100 ml mirin (Japanese condiment)

1 2/3 cups sugar

1 litre soy sauce

Put the mirin in a large pot and bring to a boil. Add the sugar and let dissolve. Add the soy sauce; then bring to a boil, lower the heat and let simmer for a couple of minutes. Skim occasionally. Let cool. Pour into a sterilized airtight jar and store in the refrigerator for at least two weeks. You can use it right away after making it, but nothing beats the aged sauce for the enhanced flavour!

*Use only a clean spoon to scoop the sauce.

Soba Salad

Serves 2-3

2 carrots, julienned

2 cups corn salad leaves, washed, pat dried

1 cup purple cabbage, thinly sliced

A bunch of chives, finely chopped

2 bundles dry soba (buckwheat noodle), one bundle size of a dollar

2 tablespoons soba sauce (mentsuyu)

2 tablespoons flaxseed oil (I like the garlic chill-flavoured one)

2 tablespoons roasted white sesame seeds

1 sheet nori

Place water in a large pot and bring to a boil. In the meantime, prepare the vegetables. Cook the soba noodles according to the instructions on the packaging. Using a colander, drain well. Rinse with cold water and drain completely. Toss the noodles with the carrots, the corn salad, the cabbage, chives, the soba sauce, the flaxseed oil and the sesame seeds. Cut the nori in thin strips and sprinkle over top of the salad. Serve immediately.

Tag: noodle

Udon Noodles: Going Back To the Basics

Soba Salad