Homemade Ramen Noodle Recipe

I am so excited to share with you the ramen recipe that we have finally perfected! First off, a little background on why my husband and I decided to pursue making our own ramen. After trying the ramen in places such as Japan, Toronto and Vancouver over the past couple of years we often get a hankering for ramen. Unlike Toronto where there are ramen places down the street, in Edmonton where I currently live, there are no places at the momen to get some good quality ramen.

We feel that a good fresh ramen noodle should have just the right amount of bite (or al dente) mouth-feel and should have a distinct flavour unto its own (non-bland).  Most ramen noodles that we've tried have been too soft or flavour-less.

Hence the quest for making our own. Flashback to this past October 2013 when us together with some of our food friends decided that we needed to test out different ramen recipes to truly figure out if we could indeed create ramen at home. November happened to be our friend's Andrea's birthday (otherwise known as Little Miss Andrea), so what better way than to have a Ramen Party? 

We even had a chalkboard depicting ramen and a hashtag to make it official!

We definitely have to thank my husband as he did most (if not all) of the grunt work. In the end, he created four different batches of ramen following different recipes and methods. When it came time to eating, we did a blind taste test of each ramen and judged the ramen using various categories. A sample of our judging chart is pictured below. 

After we had blind tasted all the ramen noodles (without broth) and tallied our scores, everyone was in agreement that Ramen A was the clear winner. Initially, it did taste slightly more alkaline, but the colour was a nice yellow and the texture of the noodle was perfectly al dente. Once Ramen A was served with the miso broth and all the toppings, it became the perfect ramen bowl. 

So, here is the recipe for Ramen A with a few modifications for taste and texture. Surprisingly, it is not a recipe found in Lucky Peach or in Momofuku. 

Ramen Ingredients:

• 480g All Purpose Flour
• 120g Bread Flour (not whole wheat)
• 1 Cup of Water
• 2 tsp of Kansui (Lye Water) mixed in 90 mL of water

Ramen Directions:

1. Measure the water and kansui (lye water) with a scale.
   
   
2. Mix the water and kansui together. Attach the bowl to the mixer and run on medium high speed for 10 minutes. It is a dry dough, and will begin to look like a bunch of gravel. Once it looks like gravel, turn the mixer off. Form the dough into a tight ball. There should be no dough pieces falling off.
   
3. Place the dough into a lightly floured bowl and cover with saran wrap. Let the dough rest for a minimum of 4 hours in the fridge. It will turn a dark yellow (almost green) after it rests in the fridge.
   
   
4. After a minimum of 4 hours in the fridge, divide the dough into 8 balls. Flatten each ball out on a flat surface. Then, run each piece through the largest setting of your pasta roller a few times, folding it in half each time. The dough will be ragged the first few runs through but will smooth out. Flour the dough generously and roll it out all the way from setting 1 to 5 on the pasta roller. You are trying to make it thinner. Use the spaghetti attachment to cut the pasta into long thin noodles. Dust the noodles with flour as they are cut to keep them from sticking together.
   
5. One serving of noodles is 142g (or 5 oz) of uncooked noodles. Prepare how much noodle you are going to cook and prepare of pot of boiling water large enough to cook your noodles. Get a timer ready. When it is at a rolling boil, put the noodles in and immediately begin the timer. Stir to keep the noodles separated. Cook the noodles for only 2 minutes 15 seconds for maximum enjoyment. Once you put the noodles into the boiling water it will stop boiling but keep the timer going to prevent overcooking.
   
   
6. Once the noodles have been cooked, pull them out and rinse the noodles under cold water. This will help rinse off any of the lye taste.
   

   

   toppings for the ramen: cha siu from Argenplath, homemade pork jowl chasui & onsen egg from L & S,
   and crab from T.

7. Add noodles to a bowl, add broth and toppings. Enjoy!
   
   

   

   Hot bowl of ramen topped with bonito flakes & sesame seeds. 

Andrea's mochi ice cream dessert

Enjoy all your hard work as this is guaranteed to satisfy your craving of ramen noodle at home. Each serving of ramen for a person is 142g. Needless to say all 11 of us ate very well that night. Hands down, a great way to celebrate a birthday with friends. 

Hopefully you will try your hand at homemade ramen noodles at home! I'm also more than happy to answer any questions. Our next challenge is to focus on the broth.