Passport & Plate - “Great Buddha” Udon Soup with Iriko Dashi broth
Japan | Thursday, February 26, 2015 | 2 photos
Ingredients
Active time: 45 minutes
Inactive time: 8 hours / Overnight
Ingredients for broth:
3-4 inch piece of kombu (dried kelp)
3 dried shiitake mushrooms
10 cups cold water
5 ounces iriko (dried sardines)
1/2 cup mirin
1/3 cup soy sauce
1 cup packed katsuobushi (dried bonito flakes)
1 cup shredded turnip
Ingredients for soup (to serve four):
16 ounces cooked Udon noodles
2 hard boiled eggs, sliced into discs or half-moons
2 scallions, sliced into small rings.
4 large shrimp, tempura-fried
1 red bell pepper, sliced into long thin slivers
How to prepare this recipeProcess:
Place iriko, mushrooms, kombu and water into a one gallon pot (or larger). Cover the pot and store in cool, dry place overnight. The refrigerator would be ideal.
The next morning, place the pot over a medium-low heat and add the mirin and soy sauce. Just before the broth gets to a boil (when you see small bubbles start to form around the edges of the surface) use a slotted spoon or a spider to remove the solids from the pot. Bring the broth to a boil and add the bonito flakes and shredded turnip to the pot. Immediately turn off the heat, cover and let the broth steep for 20 minutes.
Strain the broth through a cheesecloth-lined colander into another pot. Keep this broth on the stove on low heat for use in soup the same day, or store in a refrigerated airtight container for up to a week.
To compose the “Great Buddha” Udon noodle soup for four: Place 4 ounces of cooked Udon noodles into each bowl. Fill each bowl with warm broth. Garnish each bowl with “eyebrows” of scallion rings, “eyes” of sliced egg, a “nose” of tempura shrimp, and a “grin” of a sliced bell pepper. Slurp away.
The story behind this recipeOften, it's one humble dish that becomes the defining thumbnail of a trip. In my case, a steaming bowl of Udon in suburban Japan did the trick.
It was the Great stone Buddha of Kamakura I sought. He sat several miles up and over a ridge from the train station. I entrusted myself to the brutal breezes of Winter and forged ahead.
After a slushy, muddy, and bone-chilling morning of steep ascent and slippery descent into the seaside town of Kamakura, my lips were a blue, my toes were brittle and my beard recalled Old Saint Nick. There it was, a Great Buddha indeed. It was only after dozens of achingly necessary photos of the stone meditator that I accepted my body’s yearn for something other than deep freeze.
As if by a strike of fate, one glance up and across the road appeared my salvation. A crude depiction of a steaming noodle bowl on a tiny storefront window seemed downright comforting. I ducked through a thin curtain separating the bustling street from the steam room of my dreams.
The noodle bar was a small, savory sauna; a temple of soup. It was tiny, cozy, maybe cramped and I didn’t care. A wife-and-husband team are the only staff, the kitchen an extension of their home. As the rooster crows, she’s pulling noodles by hand as he crafts an exquisite dashi broth of dried sardines, kelp, turnip and smoked tuna shavings.
With English was as bare as my Japanese, they shared each delicious step of their Udon alchemy. They wittily finish my order of the befitting “Great Buddha U-don Noodle” with two “eyebrows” of scallions, two “eyes” of boiled egg, a “nose” of tempura shrimp and a terrific red pepper grin.
The smooth and toothsome noodles provided a satisfying game for the teeth, but it was the broth—nautical but not fishy, briny but not salty, full-bodied but not thick—that proved to be the ultimate star of the show. Therapeutic, sumptuous slurps filled my soul with a well needed elixir, an antidote to February frost. I melted. To me, this was Japan in a bowl.
