Recipe Review: Burmese Noodle Soup

I don't usually share links to other recipes here on the blog, but this one was so good that I thought it deserved a whole blog post review.

It's definitely soup season here.  The days are wet and breezy, and the amount of daylight is getting less and less.  At the end of a full day, an easy and comforting soup really satisfies.  But you can't have the same old chicken soup all the time, right?  Whenever I see a recipe for a new twist on a chicken soup, I am intrigued.  And this one was right up my alley - the flavors of the ingredients caught my attention, with coconut milk and ginger and garlic, plus noodles and chicken.  I'm sold, so we gave it a try for dinner the other night.

And I was not disappointed. At first, it's familiar - coconut and garlic and lime flavors.  But then the combination of ginger and turmeric and chili powder come in and give the broth an amazing balanced flavor.  Not spicy, but so flavorful.  It was surprising how rich and deep the flavors were, especially considering how easy this was to make. 

My picture is so terrible - these dark winter evenings.  I'm going to have to make this again so that I can get a shot of it during the day time.  But if you click through to the recipe, you'll see their much better picture.  

The ingredient list is below, so you can do your shopping.  But since it's not my recipe I won't share the full instructions here, you'll have to click over to get it.  And you'll definitely want to go over to the full recipe, as the order of ingredients and the technique is a little different. 

At first this list of ingredients is intimidating - I usually run away from recipes with this many ingredients. But most of it is stuff that I always have in the house, and I was surprised at how easy it came together.  Of course I adapted it a bit, as I always do.  

  • 2medium yellow onions
  • 4garlic cloves
  • 1teaspoon ginger, grated
  • 1teaspoon shrimp paste (belachan)
  • 1tablespoon water
  • 2tablespoons canola oil
  • 1teaspoon sesame oil
  • 1/4teaspoon turmeric powder
  • 1/2teaspoon chili powder
  • 1 1/2pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs
  • 114 oz can coconut milk
  • 2teaspoons kosher salt
  • 1packet rice noodles
  • 1/2cup shallots, thinly sliced and fried to a crisp
  • 3eggs, boiled and chopped
  • 2tablespoons chili powder
  • 2tablespoons cilantro, chopped fine
  • 2limes, quartered

So I basically at least doubled this, maybe more. Although I didn't double the onion because I only had 2.  I substituted fish sauce for the shrimp paste - that was the one ingredient that I didn't have and I didn't feel like going to the asian market just for that.  I looked it up online and got some consensus that fish sauce would be a fine substitute, and I thought it was.  I love the Natural Value brand of coconut milk - it comes in BPA free cans, and it is super rich - like 1/3 to 1/2 of the top of the can is solid coconut cream, so it gives great flavor to recipes.   I did not follow her directions for cooking the chicken, as I had leftover cooked chicken from an earlier dinner, so I just diced that and added it once I had the broth together.  In the directions she has you add a cup of water to the broth (it's not listed in the ingredients), but I couldn't resist and I added my homemade chicken stock instead. I forgot to get shallots at the store, so we skipped those.  And we skipped the extra chili powder on top, because my kids don't do spice. 

It really comes together quick, I made the broth in the afternoon and let it sit, then I finished the soup in a very short time before dinner. 

After all that - it was amazing.  Just enough spice, but not too much - three of my kids devoured it, which is not normal for them.  They not only devoured it, they raved about how good it was - which they never do.  And one even requested the leftovers for breakfast.  Winner!

Here is the link to the full recipe.  Enjoy!