Sarah has had a huge influence on me in inspiring this dish. She taught English in South Korea for over a year and during her time there she explored all the Korean dishes she could. She’d excitedly share a photo here and there and talk animatedly about the infusion of flavours and textures she’d never experienced before. When she came back home, her suitcase was filled with foodstuffs that had labels written in Korean and I had absolutely no idea what they were. She introduced us to gochujang. The Korean language would fly off her tongue as if it was her mother tongue. I couldn’t keep up with her excitement and when I wanted her to make us something that she loved whilst living there, I requested the “gotcha tongue“. That’s what it sounded like to me and because I’d never seen it written down before this is how I remembered it. Gochujang is hot, sour and umami. I think my name for it is perfect in every way because it certainly gets your tongue tingling and alive. It’s hard to describe it, but I highly recommend it if you like a bit of chilli. It’s not overpoweringly hot, it’s more a tingly hot.
On Tuesday night I made gochujang chicken spring rolls. I used mini chicken fillets for that dish. I had leftovers so I decided to make this Chicken Gochujang ramen bowl. It was absolutely delicious.
For the chicken
- 400g mini chicken fillets
- 2tbls fresh grated ginger
- 2 garlic cloves grated
- 2 Tbls grated onion
- 3 Tbs gochujang
- 1 tbls rice vinegar (optional)
- 1 Tbls water
Mix together and add the chicken. Leave to marinate for 30 min.
Fry in pan for about 3 -5 minutes. Set aside until ready to use. I used half for the sprinrolls on Tuesday and the other half for the ramen bowl.
We had roast chicken last night and I kept the carcass for chicken stock. I added a onion quartered, a chopped carrot, 2 stalks celery and 1 tsp each of salt and brewers yeast (optional). I covered that with 2 litres of water. I brought the water to the boil and then turned down to a slow simmer for 30 minutes.
Add 1 whole egg in its shell to the stock pot. I have a neat little cup holder that hangs on the side of the pot. It’s perfect for boiling an egg in the stock. This egg was in for 8 minutes. Keep it in to your liking
Place a sieve on top of the stock pot with the bottom of the sieve touching the stock
Add
3cm fresh ginger julienne (match sticks)
2 garlic cloves smashed
1/2 carrot 🥕 thinly sliced
Steam over stock for about 3 minutes. Remove and place in a bowl to be mixed with the chicken.
Add to this bowl 1 diced tomato and handful of chopped coriander and chopped chicken mini fillets. I used 8 because that’s what I had.
Boil up 1 disc of ramen noodles. You can do this in the stock pot too for about 4 minutes.
Get 2 bowls out and divide the noodles between them add the chicken and veggies and ladle over chicken stock. Add 1Tbls tamari sauce and an extra tsp of gochujang for more punchy flavour. I did ! Add half egg to each bowl, add extra tomato and coriander to garnish. Enjoy