For context, this is the first Halloweekend (as you might guess, next week is the second). That means yesterday was the first Halloween Saturday, which in turn means that there was partying.
I started off the day so well. I went to the farmer’s market at noon for the first time, and bought two sweet potatoes, a butternut squash, and a daikon radish. It’s only a few minutes away, and the attending farmers have a great selection of produce, as well as dairy and eggs. I’m excited to go back next week when I’ve finished what I already have in the fridge. I’ll be writing another post on why I’ve decided to stop using Imperfect for produce, as well as my plan going forward.
I made some pretty spectacular failures that were supposed to be salmon sweet potato pancakes. My penchant for adapting recipes definitely led me astray here, since my pancakes just could not hold together. Plus, I don’t think I like the combination of sweet potato and salmon. The turnip I added definitely didn’t help. Too bad I have two more portions left to finish. Damn.
I started this blog and made my first blog post. At around 8:20 pm, as I was writing my second (the Satsuki review), I realized I needed to change and put on a costume. I was super tempted to just stay home and blog, but I’ve been a recluse for a few weeks and really needed to socialize. I legitimately just sat and Googled “easy halloween costume” and “easy halloween costume jeans” for a few minutes until I hit on “Biker Chick.” That means I just wore pretty much what I wear to the office: leather jacket, jeans, and a high-neck top. All black, of course. I didn’t have a black bandana, so I wore the pink lace-edged one my grandma gave me. “I’m a biker chick whose black bandana is in the wash,” I say.
Needless to say, I woke up with a raging hangover at 11 am today and needed something hearty with soup. I contemplated going to get pho. The place is a few streets away and it was raining with no signs of stopping. Take-out pho is no good. I really didn’t want to put on real person clothes and brave the wet, even if pho is the ultimate hangover food, for my family at least. Whenever we feel the slightest bit unwell, whether physically or mentally, we like to bask in the restorative properties of the broth. I like mine with a bit of fire, preferably in the form of Thai chilies, and extra sour with copious amounts of lime. In Seoul, the morning after an insane night out with my sister and her friend on the day we were both flying home, my sister dragged herself and me to a pho place she’d found, suitcases in tow. We’d been partying at a noraebang (karaoke bar) until hours past dawn, and I’d gotten maybe three proper hours of sleep after an hour or so with my head in the toilet. You can imagine that hangover/residual drunkenness. It really was a mean sonovab*tch.
We’ve gotten it overseas a lot too. Yes, it sounds ridiculous. We even had pho in Prague. It feels bad, but we have to satisfy our cravings, right? Just like when we went to a Sichuan restaurant in Chefchaouen, Morocco.
But this post is not about pho. It’s about ramyun, because today I am a shut-in. Honestly, this shouldn’t be classified as a recipe, but here is how I made it.
First, I made a soft-boiled egg as per the recipe linked below. I mixed up a marinade of soy sauce, a dash of rice vinegar, sesame oil, and garlic powder. Leaving the egg to marinate, I checked in the fridge to see what I could add.
It just so happened that last week, my roommate and I visited the Artisanal Sweet Treats Bazaar at the Grand Bazaar in the Upper West Side. I wouldn’t have gone, but I saw the event and I knew that my roommate, who has a MASSIVE sweet tooth, would want to go. There was a Korean vendor there selling bindaetteok (mung bean pancakes). I bought a small tub of homemade kimchi, but it a bit harsh and wasn’t quite right. That’s how it ended up sitting in my fridge for a week, until this morning when I took the entire tub and just dumped it into the pan. Voilà– veggies and flavor with no work!
I used Shin cup ramyun since that’s all I had. I personally think the dried veggie mix is kind of gross, so I dumped it out, but you can choose to leave it in. It’s easier with the bag ramyun because it comes in a separate packet.
You can use other ramyun too, but the flavor profiles might not work with this recipe. In that case, you could also just ditch the powder pack altogether and just double or triple the ingredients, namely the gochujang, gochugaru, and the stock. Just use your creativity and taste as you go along. Needless to say, all of the ingredients below are optional if you’re using the flavor pack. I’m just dressing up something that’s already delicious!
Ingredients
water per ramyun instructions, or about 1 cup more for a lighter soup
2 cloves of garlic, cut in half
about 6 oz kimchi, chopped
1/4 cup roast chicken stock
1/2 tbsp soy marinade (soy sauce, rice vinegar, sesame oil, garlic powder)
1 tbsp gochujang (red chili paste)
1/2 tbsp gochugaru (coarsely ground red pepper)
Korean ramyun
mozzarella cheese, to taste
1 soy-marinated soft-boiled egg
chopped scallions, to taste
- Put the ramyun powder in the water with the kimchi, garlic, and stock. Bring to a boil.
- Stir in the gochujang, gochugaru, and soy marinade.
- Put the ramyun block in. Cook until about a minute short of desired consistency.
- Sprinkle the mozzarella on top, then cover the lid for about 30 seconds to melt the cheese.
- Done! To serve, slice the egg in half and place on top of the ramyun. Garnish with chopped scallions.
The addition of the marinade to the soup really helped boost it into “God, yes” territory. It was slightly too one-dimensional before; the marinade provided umami flavor that made it super delicious. If you’re not doing the soy-marinated egg, simply add a dash of soy sauce and sesame oil.
Note: if you sauté the garlic and kimchi in some oil for a minute or so before adding the water and other ingredients, it’ll make the end result more fragrant. This recipe is also good with extra water. It’ll make a soup that’s very sippable.
I made budae jjigae (Korean army stew) a few weeks ago and that was out of this world, but I wasn’t so ambitious this morning. I blame the headache. This ramyun hit just right, though I did exchange my hangover for another sort of discomfort (I’m lactose-intolerant). It’s ok. Cheese is so good!