Redneck Ramen Revival: a fea(s)t in two parts

Last week I bought a butchered Boston butt that had been cut into steaks, seasoned the steaks, and slapped them in the slow cooker over onions, garlic, and mushrooms.  After about 10 hours, I had a tasty set of pork steaks, very toothsome, and not at all chewy or tough.

I drained all of the liquid and reserved it, and chilled the liquid in the beer fridge.  Overnight, it separated into a layer of fat and a layer of gelatin.  I skimmed off the fat, and poured the gelatin into a sauce pan, added a half cup of apple cider vinegar, a half cup of water, stirred, and simmered until reduced to a pint from the quart and a half original, with a sheet of kombu added to make pork pseudo-dashi.*

I put this pint in a mason jar in the fridge.

The Official Wife began to complain- why do we have so much pork stock reserved?  We never use it.  I responded that we would make ramen.  She scoffed.

The next Sunday, after returning from church, I made ramen noodles from scratch, using Chef David Chang's Momofuku at home recipe.  Easy-peasey, lemon squeezy.  The noodles could not really be over cooked.

I brought the water to a boil, while my reconstituted pork pseudo-dashi simmered with a thinly sliced mushroom within it.  I had prepped all my garnishes except the poached egg.  I began heating the water for the poached egg once I dropped the noodles in the water; six minutes later, I dropped the egg into the poaching water, and three minutes later I drained the noodles.  They had doubled in size, and were moving independently and flowingly through the boiling water.

I strained the mushrooms out of the broth, placing them in the bottom of the soup bowl.  I fished the poached egg out of the poaching water- it was perfect.  I poured a cup of broth in the bowl, and added the noodles.  Then, atop the bed of noodles I placed some fresh basil, some fresh cilantro, three slices of serrano pepper, six halves of local semi-dried cherry tomatoes, and the egg.

The noodles and the broth together bubbled.  It was awesome.  I cut an inverted v in the egg to open the yolk.  

Then we feasted, like vikings.

David Chang, you are amazing.

A link to the recipe I used:

http://jerseygirlinportland.typepad.com/jersey_girl_in_portland_o/2012/07/alkaline-noodles-for-ramen.html

*Dashi is the broth base for ramen.  Traditionally, it is made from dried fish and other hard to get ingredients.  So I displayed adaptability.