Asian Chicken Noodle Soup – For when you want something a little different than “homestyle”
Last month I signed up for the Crazy Cooking Challenge and immediately kept an eye out for chicken noodle soup recipes. I knew I wanted something “different,” just for the sheer sake of this being your not-so-average cooking site, but really, there’s only so much you can twist and tweak a classic dish like chicken noodle soup. The requirements said it had to be soup…had to have noodles…and had to have chicken. No exceptions, so there would be no converting it into a hot pocket or casserole or anything “different.”
Or so I thought anyway.
That’s when I ran across Lynn’s Kitchen Adventures Asian version. It fits all the requirements, but isn’t exactly the standard soup you think of either. I probably wouldn’t have given it a try had it not seemed so perfect for this challenge either, so I’m glad it worked out this way. Turns out, it was delicious!
I must say, I really had my doubts about it, mostly because the ingredients are so simple and it doesn’t sit on the stove, simmering for a long period of time, which is a key step for soups in my mind. But anyway, let’s get to the food, huh?
Normally I would have homemade chicken stock in the freezer, but I’ve been looking for an excuse to use up the last of these little Knorr stock packs I received at BlogHer this year. They’re actually a lot better than I thought they would be and don’t carry the overly salted taste that most premade broths do.
And would you look at that?? I thought it’d be liquidy or maybe a dry block like bouillon cubes, but instead, they’re gel packs of sorts. Almost like strange jello shots….of chicken stock. Weird, but easily dissolved and mixed.
I think I may’ve mentioned that my can opener broke? Well I haven’t replaced it yet. Shhh. :P
If you’ve never cooked with rice noodles before, they’re quite amazing. They’re really rough and crumbly out of the package…pieces will fly everywhere, even if you’re careful. Add them to water for a few minutes, though, and they become really soft and bouncy. Yes, bouncy, as in, if you drain off the water and toss them on the table, you’ll see them bounce. Go ahead, do it!
Alright, so really, it doesn’t *look* like the most appetizing dish. It’s this sickly gray color that even with some photo editing, doesn’t really look much better.
Ew! But it smelled delicious and I was starving so at that point, I obviously carried on. Tossing on more color really helped, so I’m happy I had green onions.
Overall impression? It was better than I expected. It was really easy and fast to make, which made it even better. A little lemon or lime juice could really go a long way in kicking it up a notch in the flavor department, too.
Oh, and I had never used coconut milk before because well, I really dislike coconut, remember? When the can was opened and the smell hit me, I started having even more doubts, but it added a creaminess that straight broth couldn’t…and it didn’t actually *taste* like coconut, so once the smell died down, I was happy with the results, hehe. I added more liquid to my bowl than what’s showing in the pictures and oh my god, I was so stuffed by the end. I had no idea it would be so filling.
For the original recipe, check out Lynn’s Kitchen Adventures. She has a version that doesn’t use the coconut milk, too, which looks more like this:
My version of the recipe ended up being for a smaller batch. Take note I didn’t just cut the original in half, and actually used almost the full amount of some of the ingredients anyway.
Asian Chicken Noodle Soup
1 sheet of rice vermicelli noodles
3 cups chicken broth
2/3 can coconut milk
A large splash of soy sauce
One inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled
1 cup cooked chicken
1 cup finely sliced cabbage/carrot slaw mix
1/2 teaspoon chili garlic sauce, tweaked to taste
Handful of diced green onions
Soak noodles in warm water until you’re ready for them. 3 minutes is usually plenty, but it won’t hurt to let them sit longer. Heat chicken broth, coconut milk, soy sauce, and ginger to a boil. Let simmer for 5ish minutes. I let it cook a little longer to try to get more flavor out of the ginger…which still couldn’t really be tasted much in the final dish, so I would probably go even longer. Add chicken and let cook until everything is heated through. Drain noodles and cut into thirds using scissors or butcher knife. It’s a lot easier to eat this way. Add them to the soup, plus the cabbage mix. Let heat just for another minute or two, pull out the ginger pieces, and you’re ready to go. Add green onions, hot sauce, and some salt or extra soy sauce to taste.
Lop-eared bunny peeler – Awww!
Nablopomo – Anything you’d like
Anything I’d like? Uh, yeah, how about an adorable vegetable peeler that when posed correctly, looks like the sweetest little lop-eared bunny? Yes please!
When I went to BlogHer this year, I also had the opportunity to meet up with some friends that weren’t connected to the conference. In fact, ones that didn’t even know I had any websites, much less silly food-related ones. You see, I’m their guild and raid leader in that lovely game World of Warcraft so they know me as the slightly harder core chick who is yelling at them to get out of stuff on the ground and to kill harder.
As you can imagine, it made for some interesting stories right off the bat about why I was in San Diego and why I was, uh, wearing bunny ears. There went my street cred. :P
Anyway, so this guy had some tricks of his own up his sleeve. Given he had no idea my fun food obsessions, it was awesome that he had pre-picked the quirky Urban Mo’s Bar and Grill for the brunch buffet. (Click the link for cool video and description, but it’s not completely PG in alcoholic and GLBT references, so beware.)
Afterwards, we headed to a nearby novelty shop that carried a ton of those weird products I sometimes post about. It was like Quirky Cookery in store-form. And again, he had no idea in advance that I was over-the-top into this sort of stuff, lol.
When we ran across this bunny peeler, I started to take a picture because I thought it was perfect for the whole bunny theme thing I had going on that weekend, but he insisted on buying it instead. With all the craziness of the rest of the weekend, though, I didn’t think about it again until I got home and wanted to take pictures of it.
Then? Oh my god! I hadn’t really looked at it closely, but twisting the tail is what causes the bunny ears to move so you can use either the peeler or the knife separately, and then twist them back inside to cover the blades safely.
Adorable! Even the packaging was adorable. Who knew the plastic covering would be cute even? Ha.
NaBloPoMo is here yet again – 30 day blogging challenge
It’s that time of year again. The time of year where I join a whole bunch of other people in writing/posting my butt off. While some of the crew are writing full novels in 30 days, the blogger variety is making sure they post every day for National Blog Posting Month.
Some years I’ve gone with a theme, like in 2008 when I did a whole month of “quirky art” on the QJ site, and others, not so much, like last year here where I just shifted my focus to making sure I showed you a whole bunch of weird food-related stuff.
This year? A variation on this:
No, I will not be drawing. :p It’ll all be food-related, whether mine or someone else’s, and will be some interpretation of each thing on the list.
So today? “Yourself”?
Quirky Jessi and some guy wearing a sun costume at BlogHer for the Jimmy Dean (mmm, sausage) No Kid Hungry Pledge. His sheepish grin is because he was a little surprised to be standing next to someone else dressed up…and not being paid for it, ha. And yes, my ears do indeed match my shirt. What of it?
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