STI: Oodles of comfort food

March 12, 2009

Eat to live

Oodles of comfort food

Cut out the fat and ramen can be healthy too, says SYLVIA TAN

 

My favourite comfort food? Just give me a bowl of noodles. In recent years, this has taken the form of a bowl of Japanese ramen. Originally a Chinese pork noodle soup, the Japanese have made it their own with ubiquitous touches such as topping it with nori seaweed and using dashi, their bonito-seaweed stock, to flavour the soup.

 

While it is a popular Japanese fast food (you cannot miss the many ramen shops in their cities), the dish really took off after the quirky film Tampopo was shown everywhere. It was about the rivalry between two ramen shops and the painstaking efforts taken by its cooks to make the best stock.

 

I fell in love with ramen all over again when I ate a bowl in Kobe recently. It was hard to find that shop, but after many missteps and wrong turns, the ramen was worth it with its milky white broth and rich flavours.

 

I wanted to eat it again and again, but was worried about the amount of monosodium glutamate found in commercial offerings, the fatty cuts of meat used and yes, the huge amount of carbohydrate found in the bowl.

 

I re-thought the recipe and came to this conclusion. Ramen is inherently healthy, provided the stock is not fatty, you choose a lean cut of meat and there are more vegetables in the dish.

 

All this is quite easily done.

 

To de-fat the stock, which I now regularly do, I make it a day ahead and leave it in the fridge overnight. That makes it easy to remove the layer of solidified fat in the morning.

 

As for the meat, while the loin - the traditional cut favoured - is relatively lean, there is a layer of fat surrounding the flesh, which ramen aficionados love. Otherwise, they will opt for the marbled rib-eye, again a fatty cut.

 

I decided to use the tenderloin or the fillet instead, because it is very lean and yet very tender.

 

If you cook it on gentle heat, the flavour will not be lost during the cooking and you will not miss the fat.

 

As I do not do physical work as, say, a stevedore would, I am also concerned about the amount of calories found in the bowl. While I could replace the noodles with a complex carbohydrate such as wholewheat spaghetti, a simpler option would be to up the vegetable-starch ratio found in the bowl.

 

In such simple ways, my favourite comfort food becomes healthier and I can indeed eat it again and again.

 

wdspice@singnet.com.sg

 

Sylvia Tan is a freelance writer

 

RECIPE

LEAN RAMEN

(For 4-6)

 

Stock:

4-5 cups of water

1 large pork soup bone

1 chicken carcass, stripped of skin and fat

2 cups dashi, made by placing a 5g piece of kombu (giant kelp) in 500ml of water. Bring just to the boil, turn off heat and add 20g of dried bonito flakes to infuse. Strain when cool

1 tsp salt

1 tsp light soya sauce

1 tsp sugar

1 tbsp rice wine

1 whole pork tenderloin, about 400g

1/2 head Chinese cabbage, cut into pieces

2-3 eggs, hard-boiled, each cut into half

4-6 dried ramen noodle bundles - you can use the plain instant noodles without soup flavouring

 

Garnishes:

1 stalk spring onion, chopped

Bottled seasoned bamboo shoot, optional, found in supermarkets

Bottled chilli-bean paste, optional, found in supermarkets

Shredded black nori seaweed

 

Method:

 

The day before, place pork bone and chicken carcass in a pot. Add the water and bring to the boil. Turn down heat to a gentle simmer and cook for an hour. Add the strained dashi stock. Cool and chill covered in the fridge overnight.

 

The next day, remove the layer of fat on the surface. Bring the stock back to the boil and season with salt, light soya sauce, sugar and rice wine.

 

Place whole pork tenderloin into the pot. Cook on gentle heat until cooked. (Test with a fork after 15minutes. It should be tender and the juices should run clear.)

 

Remove and when cool, slice thinly. Divide into four or six portions. Leave aside.

 

Bring stock back to the boil and wilt the cabbage leaves. Remove with a slotted spoon. Taste stock and adjust seasoning to taste, if needed.

 

Bring another pot of water to boil and cook noodle bundles according to package instructions.

 

To serve, place individual serves of noodles in a bowl, top with boiled cabbage, slices of pork and half a hard-boiled egg. Add a spoonful each of seasoned bamboo shoot and bottled chill bean paste, if liked.

 

Garnish with chopped spring onion and shredded seaweed.

 

You wouldn't believe that this is health food.