The Soup Review: Yook Gae Jang (Korean Beef and Scallion Soup)

This is one of my favorite dishes of all time and is the inspiration for my own spicy noodle soups.  Enoki mushrooms, scallions, egg, clear noodles (dak myun), and long ropes of chewy yet tender pulled beef come together in a wonderfully spicy-savory broth.  Today's rendition was courtesy of the Wooram Korean restaurant found in the Edison H-Mart.  Red pepper figures heavily into this hot soup in both dried and paste form, so it is not for the faint of heart, nor those prone to heartburn.  In doing a little research online, there are variations in what goes in(of course), but I think that I prefer this type.  Bean sprouts, mushrooms and fern bracken are possible ingredients, and the egg can be cooked separately.  If you ever have the chance to eat and/or cook this soup... do it!

Spicy Bok Choi and Beef Noodle Soup

This is one of several versions of spicy Asian-style noodle soup that I enjoy making, and last night's batch was especially good.  I was a little generous with the Korean red pepper, resulting in something a bit more fiery than usual- but that's perfect for these damp and chilly fall days!  I do caution the reader that "to taste" is most important here: what is "fiery" for myself and Andrew often is impossibly spicy for our friends, for instance.

To begin, one must collect the ingredients.  We took a trip to our local H-Mart, a huge and exciting Asian grocery store.  It is understandable that not everywhere has easy access to such places, but one might get lucky at their local food market, or make use of the internet to order supplies online.

Ingredients :
-Korean coarse red pepper powder, to taste
-chipotle chili powder, to taste
-reduced sodium soy sauce, about 1/4 cup
-1 tbsp mirin
-1 tbsp vegetable oil
-1 tbsp bulgogi marinade
-four cloves of garlic, crushed
-three bunches of baby bok choi
-3/4 lb thinly sliced beef rib-eye steak
-two bunches of "MasterChef whole grain Asian noodle" (or any amount of any type of Asian noodle that you desire)
  
*Serves two

 To begin making the soup, marinate thinly sliced rib-eye steak in soy sauce; if you want to, add some Korean bulgogi marinade (which I just happened to have on hand last night).  Let the meat sit in the marinade for one hour unrefrigerated.  Meanwhile, rinse your bok choi.  I recommend baby bok choi, since I prefer a higher leaf to stem ratio.  Chop the stalks up to the base of the leaf; reserve the leaves for the end of the cooking process.  Heat one tablespoon of vegetable oil in your soup pot on medium-high until there is a nice sheen to the oil.  Add your chopped bok choi stalks to the oil, stirring with a wooden spoon to evenly coat them with the hot oil.  Add (Korean) red pepper powder and chipotle chili powder to taste.  Cook, stirring with medium frequency, until the spice begins to stick to the bottom of the pot.  Deglaze with mirin (a type of sweet Japanese cooking wine) and turn off the heat.  Crush fresh garlic and stir it into the pot at this time.

When your beef is ready, heat a non-stick skillet on high heat.  Working in batches, quickly sear the beef until it is browned, adding each batch to the soup pot.  Tongs are extremely helpful for this.  If you have any marinade left after cooking the beef, add that to the soup pot as well.  Add enough water to the pot to cover all of the ingredients, keeping in consideration that you have yet to add your noodles and bok choi leaves.  Stir, cover, and bring to a boil.

Once the water is boiling, add your noodles.  Most Asian-type noodles do not need very much time to cook at all.  I usually use a generic type of Asian noodle, but have used rice and glass noodles to good effect.  I suspect udon and ramen noodles would work very well too.  Most noodles recommend being cooked separately and then being added to the recipe.  I do not do this for two reasons: to reduce clean up time, and also because I have a very small kitchen.  Feel free to follow this recommendation if you like, but I've always found my soup to be quite satisfactory with the noodles cooked in the broth.  After about five minutes boiling my noodles, I added the bok choi leaves and boiled for one more minute.  Cool slightly and serve.  Enjoy this spicy-savory soup!