Pork and Mushrooms Noodle Soup

The fresh shiitake and enoki mushrooms were meant for sukiyaki but thirty minutes before I was due to start lunch yesterday, I got flustered. In all the Japanese restaurants I have eaten in and I have eaten in a lot of them sukiyaki has always been served as a soup. Then, I saw an article by a Japanese lady that says sukiyaki is a fried dish and the eggs are for dipping the hot beef and vegetables into. Sounds more delicious than the sukiyaki soup served in Japanese restaurants in the Philippines (shall I call them bastardized sukiyaki now?) but something that would require quite a set-up like a skillet on the dining table itself and that wasn’t something I could manage.

So, I did some fast thinking. There was a huge pot of broth on the stove, lots of boiled pork ribs, and egg noodles. Why not a pork and mushroom noodle soup? That should go well with the siopao that remained from Friday night’s dinner.

Heat the broth to boiling. Lower the heat and simmer until required. Cook the egg noodles according to package directions. Drain and divide equally among four soup bowls. Blanch the mushrooms in boiling water for about 30 seconds, drain, cut, and divide into four portions. Arrange in the bowls beside the noodles. Reheat the pork by dropping it in the simmering broth for a few minutes. Scoop out, divide into four portions, and arrange in the bowls with the noodles and mushrooms. Slice the egg thinly, divide it into four portions, and place it in the bowls with the rest of the ingredients. Pour hot broth into the bowls. Sprinkle with sliced onion leaves and toasted garlic bits.

For instructions on how to prepare the mushrooms, please refer to the shiitake and enoki entries. How much meat should go into each bowl of noodles depends on you. As a guide, start with 1/4 cup of meat pieces per person. What I did is to use the minimum amount and then served all the remaining meat on a separate plate. Those complaining of too little meat in their bowl (like my husband) just got more from the plate of meat.