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I’ve been eating at least 2 bowls of this a day since I made this wonton soup on Monday. Today I ate my last bowl. :( I did, however, make Alex 1 giant bowl (equivalent of two bowls) and gave two bowls to my friend Moy, who I mentioned bought me the camera I’ve been taking my food pictures with in an earlier post. As part of my anti-corporate practices, I bartered with him—two meals a week for the next three months for a digital point-and-shoot camera to start this blog. Sure, that’s a lot of work on my end, but I love cooking, and I especially love cooking for friends. This is also probably the best deal we’ll make in our lives. Who even barters anymore?
Anyway, for this wonton soup, I took a trip to one of my favorite Vietnamese grocery stores in Uptown called Tai Nam Market. For $15 (not bad for 10 bowls of soup), I bought a pound and a half of whole shrimp, a pound of ground pork, a bundle of baby bok choy, a bunch of cilantro, scallions, wonton wrappers, Hong Kong style egg noodles, and bean sprouts.
I eyeballed almost everything, so you’ve gotta use the taste-and-try method if you want to use this (broth) recipe. Most restaurants throw in a little bit of MSG to enhance the flavor of their broth and wontons, but MSG is banned in my kitchen and I don’t find it necessary if I use enough raw main ingredients.
Wonton Filling
Yields 45 wontons.
- 1½ lbs shrimp, peeled and deveined(whole shrimp is required for this recipe since you’ll be using the shells to flavor the broth)
- 1 lb ground pork
- 2 Tbsp minced ginger
- 1 Tbsp minced garlic
- 4 Tbsp minced yellow onion
- 5 Tbsp chopped scallions
- ground white pepper
- salt
- 45 wonton wrappers
- 1 whisked egg yolk
- Mince the shrimp and combine in a large bowl with ground pork, ginger, garlic, yellow onion, scallions, white pepper, and salt. Mix well.
- Scoop half a Tablespoon on to a wonton wrapper, dab the edges of the wrapper with egg yolk, and fold in half to seal the wonton.
Shrimp Broth:
Yields about 10 bowls.
- 4 cups organic chicken stock
- approx 8 cups water
- 1½ lbs shrimp shells
- fish sauce, to taste
- organic raw cane sugar, to taste
- onion powder, to taste
- Combine chicken stock, water, and shrimp shells in a large pot and bring to a boil.
- Allow flavors to settle for 10 minutes, then add fish sauce, cane sugar, and onion powder by the tablespoon until it is flavorful enough for your palette. Consider the flavor of the wontons and baby bok choy will add once you boil it in the broth for five minutes for every serving. If it gets too salty, simply add more water to dilute it and balance out the flavor.
- To prepare a bowl, bring a small pot of water to a boil and and steep egg noodles for 10 seconds (no longer, or else they will overcook and become soggy), rinse with cold water, and toss in a serving bowl.
- Throw in wontons (cooked for 5 minutes in broth) and baby bok choy (cooked for 3 minutes).
- Pour in enough broth to fill the bowl.
- Garnish with fresh cilantro, scallions, bean sprouts, a pinch of black pepper, and Sriracha.
- Devour and enjoy!
I froze 4 portions of the extra broth to use for ramen, which I’ll be making from scratch for the first time on Sunday with Alex. And I didn’t do it this time, but with extra wontons, you can either freeze them, or fry them and eat them with homemade sweet and sour sauce.
