Cook Clams In Miso Soup For A Fresh Spin On The Classic
For the times when you need something hearty but you're short on time, miso soup always delivers. While the dish certainly has a satisfying taste, sometimes it can leave you feeling a little hungry if you treat it as more than an appetizer. To bulk up miso soup with a delicious spin, add clams.
Clams are such a simple way to enhance meals without much effort. When you want to make your seafood boil a little classier or you're in the mood for restaurant-quality pasta, steaming the bivalves in white wine or whipping up some quick linguine and clams is the way. Clams toe the line between sweet and salty, bringing a pleasant briny to every dish, including simple miso soup. Miso is umami and richly savory, creating the perfect broth for flavoring clams. Clam miso soup is already quite popular in Japan — the dish is said to be the antidote for a hangover, so you can sip some the morning after knocking back a few too many sake bombs.
Clams don't take too long to cook, so the recipe should come together fairly quickly. Once you've cleaned the clams, add them to a pot of water, along with some dashi, if you have it. When the water starts to boil, reduce the temperature to medium low and use a mesh skimmer to remove any dirt that's floated to the surface. After the clams have opened, turn off the stove and swirl in the miso paste.
What ingredients can you add to clam miso soup?
The combination of clams and miso paste is already heavenly, but a few extra ingredients can definitely bring the dish together even more. Since both the seafood and miso are already quite salty, adding in things that are on the lighter, more herbaceous side is the best choice. Green onions are always a welcome addition to miso soup, and you can use the white part, as well. After mincing the onion, saute the white onions in shallow water until they've softened. Add water and clams to make the soup and toss in the green onions at the end for a crisp, peppery bite in each sip.
A few veggies can also bulk up the soup and give it a healthy touch. Julienne a carrot and add them in when the clams start to open up so they can soften and infuse the soup with a mildly sweet flavor. While that's simmering, chop up some bok choy and sprinkle them in about two or three minutes before adding the miso paste.
Shiitake mushrooms are another great addition to flavor miso soup. Since they bring their own share of umami to the soup, spring for milder white miso rather than red. If you want that deep, savory taste, you can stir both red and white miso together, or just use one tablespoon of red miso.