15 recipes. Page 1 of 1
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Instead of broth, these small boiled dumplings get a tangy dressing of soy sauce, vinegar and chili oil that clings to their thin wrappers. Mini dumplings tear easily, so the sauce is spooned on top and the dumplings are turned gently rather than tossed.
Despite a name that means water-boiled fish, the bowl arrives under a layer of red chili oil. Thin slices of white fish, coated in starch, poach gently in a doubanjiang broth so they stay tender inside all that heat. Hot chili oil poured over Sichuan peppercorns at the end sizzles and releases the numbing aroma, and bean sprouts underneath catch the broth. It is intense enough that rice on the side is not optional.
Peanut butter does the heavy lifting in this sauce, with sesame oil supplying the sesame aroma, so the dish comes together without hunting down Chinese sesame paste. Soy, vinegar, sugar, and chili oil turn it sweet, salty, tart, and gently hot all at once. The noodles get a short ice bath that firms them up, and julienned cucumber and scallion cut through the dense coating. A cold, fast bowl for hot weather.
Smoked duck brings fat and smoke, and this salad answers with a sharp soy-vinegar dressing spiked with chili oil plus thin slices of Korean pear that burst with juice. The duck gets only 3 minutes over medium heat, skin side down, to render its fat without drying out the meat. Gosari, the bracken fern Koreans usually eat as a seasoned side dish, is blanched for just 1 minute so it loses any off flavor but keeps its chewy bite. The pear is tossed with a little dressing as soon as it is sliced, which slows browning, and meets the greens only at serving time. Red chard and finely shredded cabbage give the plate a crisp base.
A Sichuan fish soup that gets its sourness from rinsed pickled mustard greens and its heat from dried chilies and chili oil. Thin slices of white fish, lightly coated in starch, turn silky and soft in the red broth.
Shrimp, squid and springy fresh wheat noodles share a dark, glossy dressing of chili oil, soy sauce and oyster sauce. Oyster sauce bridges the seafood's briny sweetness and the soy base, so the bowl leans toward savory depth rather than plain saltiness. Blending the chili oil evenly into the soy seasoning before tossing lets it coat the noodles and seafood in a thin, even film. Speed decides the texture: a short blanch and a quick high-heat toss keep the shrimp bouncy and the squid tender instead of rubbery. The noodles keep softening while they are mixed, so they come out of the pot 30 seconds short of the package time, and both noodles and seafood are drained hard so no water dilutes the sauce.
Chewy beef tripe, soft blood curd and soybean sprouts share a doenjang-seasoned bone broth, and the bowl is heavy with them. The green onion and chili oil wait until after the 20-minute simmer, leaving the red oil floating on top.
From Guilin in China's Guangxi region come these slender rice noodles, smooth and slightly springy, soaking up a clear beef brisket broth as the bowl sits. Pickled radish adds crisp, vinegary bites that cut the beefiness and reset the palate, and chili oil drizzled at the end spreads a slow warmth through the soup.
This bowl follows the shape of Chinese dan dan noodles but swaps in Korean flavors: doenjang (fermented soybean paste) and soy sauce season the pork, and unsweetened soy milk forms the broth. Frying the chopped kimchi with the browned pork tames its sourness so it blends into the nutty chili-oil broth instead of standing apart. If the doenjang starts sticking to the pan, lower the heat right away to keep bitterness out.
Beef shank simmered for 2 hours with star anise, cinnamon and ginger yields a clear broth with a gentle spice aroma. The dish comes from Lanzhou in Gansu province, where the noodles are hand-pulled; store-bought Chinese wheat noodles stand in for them. Keeping the pot at a quiet simmer the whole time decides whether the broth stays clear. Daikon, sliced beef, cilantro and chili oil finish each bowl.
Wide, thick noodles take on the numbing tingle of Sichuan peppercorns, the heat of chili oil, the tang of black vinegar and the fermented saltiness of doubanjiang (chili bean paste) all at once. The numbing note comes from warming the peppercorns briefly in chili oil over low heat, pulled off before they darken or smell scorched. Heat is best adjusted with the amount of doubanjiang rather than more chili oil, which keeps the flavor clean. Because the noodles are so broad, a sauce with oil floating on top seasons them unevenly, so the sauce gets stirred to the bottom and the noodles are tossed hard. Boiled 1 minute short of the package time, they stay chewy to the last bite. Bok choy blanched in the noodle water adds a crisp, green bite between the oily strands.
No broth at all: hot, thick noodles are tossed with chili-oil pork, chives, scallion, fish powder, and a raw yolk until everything coats the strands. The noodles skip the cold rinse so they reach the bowl hot and the yolk loosens into a sauce. The pork must be cooked down until no thin liquid remains in the pan; otherwise water pools at the bottom and the mix turns uneven. Spreading the toppings in a ring instead of one pile keeps the flavor from bunching up when everything is mixed. Fish powder and nori bring the savory depth a soup would normally supply.
Black vinegar and chili oil hit at the same time, sour and hot, over a chicken stock with slippery, springy sweet potato starch noodles. Both are added to the bowl rather than the pot, leaving each person free to tune the sourness. The noodles turn clear before they are fully done; the real signal is when the firm center disappears but the bounce remains.
A pork bone broth thickened with sesame paste and miso turns creamy and heavy, and pork mince fried with doubanjiang, a Sichuan chili bean paste, sits on top with a slick of chili oil. In this Japanese ramen take on Sichuan dan dan noodles, there is plenty of soup and sesame leads the flavor. The sesame paste and miso get a brief stir over low heat before any stock is added, which draws out their nutty aroma, but they come off before they brown. The stock is then whisked in a little at a time so no lumps remain. The pork fries until its moisture cooks off and the edges brown, and the heat drops to medium if the doubanjiang starts to scorch. Shake the boiled noodles well, since extra water dilutes the thick broth fast.
Sesame paste whisked into chicken stock turns the broth thick, tan, and nutty, and a spoonful of crumbly pork plus a drizzle of chili oil sit on top as separate layers of salt and heat. Doubanjiang, a fermented chili bean paste, gives that pork its savory backbone, and the pork is fried until its moisture is gone and the edges brown and crisp. Stirring the bowl gradually blends the chili oil into the sesame broth, changing the taste of the soup from the first sip to the last. Peanut butter can stand in for half the sesame paste, and the amount of doubanjiang sets the heat. The noodles come out a little before the package time so they stay firm in the hot soup. Blanched bok choy adds a crisp, green bite against all that richness.