Fully Loaded Miso Soup

This is my go-to soup when I'm trying to take it easy.

I love miso soup at Japanese restaurants because it's the perfect appetizer: whets your appetite without filling you up. However, for a full meal, you need to add a little more substance. Any ingredients beyond tofu, scallions, and miso paste are optional. Experiment!


Fully Loaded Miso Soup

Servings: 2

Ingredients:

3 cups of water

3 tblsp of miso paste

1 cup of soft tofu, cubed small

handful of chopped scallions

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A dozen udon noodles (here, inaka udon)

1 cup of white mushrooms, thinly sliced

1. In a secondary pot, cook udon noodles until al dente.

2. In your main soup pot, bring the water to a boil. Then simmer.

3. Dissolve the miso paste by stirring and crushing against the sides of the pot.

4. Bring soup back to a medium boil. Add tofu. Cook for 3 to 5 minutes.

5. Add mushrooms and noodles. Cook for 3 to 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.

6. Add scallions and boil just a little longer (1 min max).

7. Serve in nice big bowls.

Why should you make it?
#1. It's an easy, well-balanced, almost-vegetarian meal. The only problem is that it can be really salty. You can control the sodium level by putting more or less of the miso paste.
#2. No blender, no fuss. Minimal chopping, and simply boiling some water.
#3. It's perfect year-round, including the summer because there's little stove-top time. It's a necessity in certain parts of the country. For example, by the end of this year, I will have spent three consecutive summers in the humid swamp that is D.C, and I certainly stay away from the oven like the plague during that time.

Why should you not make this?
#1. You have to find miso paste. It's not that difficult -- find an Asian grocer and look on the refrigerated shelves. It does mean braving all that crazy ethnic... stuff.
#2. It's not actually proper miso soup. I just dissolve miso paste in water. Japanese people use all sorts of broths, etc, and they probably put different miso pastes to different uses. I go to the grocery store and pick up the plastic tub whose color or branding looks most appealing. I can't taste the difference, and unless you're a super-taster, neither will you!

Food without fuss is the best!