Miso Soup

a super easy thing to cook given that you have all the ingredients but all can be found in an asian supermarket.

Prep Time: 10 mins

Cook Time: 15 mins

Total Time: 30 mins

Servings: 4

Ingredients:

For Miso Soup (4 bowls)

  • 4 cups dashi (960 ml)

  • Ingredients of your choice (I used 6 dried shiitake mushrooms, which i soaked in hot water for about 15 mins and a small handful of dried seaweed, which i soaked in cold water for also 15 minutes)

  • 3-4 Tbsp miso

  • 1 green onion/scallion (finely chopped)

Method:

  1. In a soup pot add your Dashi Packet or Dashi Powder with appropriate amount of water, follow instructions on packet to get around 4 cups (960 ML). or you can make your own dashi, see the how to from just one cookbook https://www.justonecookbook.com/homemade-miso-soup/. it is SURPRISINGLY very simple and doesn’t take too much time.

  2. if you Don’t have any dense ingredients go to step 3. dense ingredients are things like carrots, pumpkin/squash, potato, etc... add those INGREDIENTS to the dashi, Once boiling lower the heat and simmer until the ingredients become tender.

  3. If you don’t have any quick cooking ingredients, bring dashi to a boil and go to step 4.  quick cooking ingredients are things like bean sprouts, cabbage, eggplant, mushrooms, deep fried tofu etc... After dashi starts to boil, add in the soft vegetables then let the soup simmer and not BOILING.

  4. Add a small amount of miso at a time (you can start with 2 Tbsp miso for 2 cups dashi). Put miso inside a ladle and slowly add dashi into the ladle to dissolve miso completely or use a fine-mesh miso strainer that can help dissolve the miso faster. If you accidentally added too much miso, dilute the miso soup with dashi (or water).  never overboil miso soup because it loses nutrients, flavors, and fragrance.

  5. once the miso is completely dissolved, if you want tofu in your soup this is the time to add it in. you can also add the seaweed or green onions if using.

  6. serve immediately and enjoy!

**Storage

Best is to use up all the miso soup because the fragrance and taste will be lost as time passes by. but if you have leftovers, Let your miso soup cool at room temperature (up to 4 hours) and then refrigerate. You can keep for up to 2 days in the refrigerator. If you want to make a big batch, it is best to keep the soup BEFORE adding miso. Add the miso only for the portion you need. You can freeze miso soup for up to 2 weeks. If the miso soup contains potatoes or tofu, remove them before freezing as the textures subject to change.

**Reheating Miso Soup

In a pot, bring miso soup to warm temperature, but CAREFUL not to overboil. Miso loses its nutrients at high temperature.

when you look at the ingredient list you really don’t think it could be that simple but it really is. and the soup base is very basic, so in the end this soup is so VERSATILE as you can add ingredients you like and omit ones you don’t like or don’t have. i have made my own dashi before and it really is that simple if you have kombu and katsuobushi, i even made dried furikake with the leftovers, it doesn’t make much but still quite delicious. i even think even though this is so simple, it tastes better than what you get in some restaurants as i think they use premade mixes. if you can find these ingredients then i would highly recommend making it at home.

cooking, japanese, soupJackie Wongmiso, miso soupComment