Stay Fresh
Towards the end of last week, I picked up some fresh rice noodles from a Vietnamese grocer on Victoria Street. I was very excited to come upon them, as every time I go out for Pho I adore the beautiful, slippery noodles. For years I have been buying the dried rice noodles, which re-hydrate to some extent in water but are never as texturally pleasing as fresh noodles. Now I don’t think I can ever go back to dried, fresh is best!
On Saturday night I decided to make a chicken soup and add some fresh rice noodles. They were beautiful in the soup - perfectly soft and slippery, just as they should be. This soup helped me Stay Fresh after an absolutely fabulous, fun and delicious work Christmas lunch - which involved a few glasses of wine, naturally.
I used the same stock recipe for the soup as I used in this post, however I added a few slices of fresh ginger. After draining the stock, I added in fresh carrot, celery and peas along with some chicken breast. I poached the chicken until cooked through, then removed it and once cooled, shredded it.
The chicken was a little tough, which I am thinking was because we used breast. Next time we’ll use thigh meat, or perhaps put in a whole chicken and use the leftover meat for sandwiches. Pray tell, what part of the bird do you use when making chicken soup?
Just before serving I added some chopped spinach to the soup and let it wilt slightly, as well as the shredded chicken. Once served into bowls I topped it with spring onion, matchsticks of fresh ginger and a generous dollop of chilli garlic sauce.
This soup was really delicious, despite the tough meat. The noodles were just delightful. I feel like a whole world of noodley possibilities has opened up to me, now that I have discovered fresh rice noodles. I find the flavour and texture are far superior than dried rice noodles. Sorry, dried noodles…it’s true.
