It’s difficult to find good vegan ramen in LA.  It’s easy to find vegetarian ramen, but usually since the noodles have egg in them, it’s hard to find vegan one. There’s Shojin, which has vegan ramen, but it’s expensive for what it is and not that delicious given the price.

Because of this, I made vegan ramen the other night. I received a lot of requests for a recipe after posting a picture of it.  As you know, I’m not so good about measuring things or writing down recipes, but here’s some hand-wavey instructions.  The tofu-like thing was store-bought. I’m not sure if there’s an equivalent in American super markets, but it’s called tofu bao in Chinese super markets and it’s basically tofu skin folded into layers and then deep fried so that the outer layer is nice and crispy.  You can sub in fried tofu, baked tofu, or inari.

Broth:

1. Cut the whites of 3-4 scallions into 2 inch pieces.
2. Cut the stems off 6-7 fresh shiitake mushrooms. (save caps for later)
3. Cut up a daikon radish into 1 inch rounds.
4. Heat up a soup pot with a few glugs of neutral oil. I used canola. When the oil is hot, throw in the scallion whites and shiitake mushrooms and sautee until both are browned.
5. Add in the daikon radish, 5 cups of water, a pieces of kombu, and bring to a boil.
6. As soon as the water is boiled, take out the kombu (save for later), cover, lower to a simmer, and boil for 30 minutes or however long it takes you to get the other ingredients ready.
7. When the broth is ready to be ladled over the noodle, it’s time to season. Turn off the heat.
8. Add in 1 tablespoon white miso paste (dilute this in a few tablespoons of hot water to make it easy to stir)
9. A few glugs of high quality soy sauce
10. A glug of mirin
11. Salt to taste

Soy glazed shiitake mushrooms:

1. Slice the saved caps of the mushrooms into thin, quarter-inch slices.
2. Heat a glug of oil in a pan and when the oil is hot, throw in the mushrooms.
3. Leave the mushrooms on the pan until browned on one side, and then toss to the other side. You want to get these mushrooms pretty dry and brown. It takes about 10 minutes.
4. While the mushrooms are cooking, mix 1 teaspoons soy sauce and 1/2 teaspoon mirin.
5. When the mushrooms are done, turn off the heat but leave the mushrooms in the hot pan. Push them together into a heap and slowly drizzle the soy sauce mirin mixture on, stirring slightly to evenly distribute.
6. Set aside for noodle topping

Kombu strip topping:

1. Take the saved kombu and slice it into thin strips.
2. Toss with a dash of soy sauce, a glug of toasted sesame oil, and a dash of rice vinegar.
3. Set aside for noodle topping

To assemble:

1. Cook the noodle in boiling water according to package instructions.
2. Drain the noodles and put in a large noodle bowl.
3. Add in the fried tofu skin
4. Ladle the broth over the fried tofu skin to warm it
5. Top with the shiitake mushrooms, kombu strips, and sliced scallion greens