I had my first thukpa in a Tibetan restaurant in Thamel, Kathmandu. It was raining today, and the chill in the air reminded me of the steaming bowl of noodle soup. So the hunt began for creating perfect thukpa. I came across this recipe for thukpa (from Awesome Cuisine) on the Internet. It looked appetizing, so I decided to make it.
- Minced/Ground meat – 250 gm (instead, I tried shredded chicken)
- Egg noodles – 300 gm (Remember you only need a fistful of pasta for each servings of carbs)
- Onion – 2 large, finely chopped
- Onion leaves – 1 tbsp. chopped
- Garlic – 3 flakes, chopped
- Green chilli – 4 to 5 pieces, sliced
Let’s make it.
- Fry chopped onions with garlic and green chillies, then add meat, fry for 10 mins (or follow your instinct; I cooked shredded chicken until I could not see redness.)
- Add salt to taste. Then keep aside after cooking.
- Boil 4 liters of water vigorously (I found that funny. What does “vigorously” boiling water mean, I wonder?). Drop noodles, boil for 2 min (I prefer my noodles al dente, not thoroughly cooked. Perhaps the most common misconception about the term is the idea that “to the tooth” means the item should stick to the teeth stirring occasionally.
- Drain the noodles through a large sieve and run cold water over them to stop them from sticking (but I would not recommend rinsing it if you make a pasta dish. Rinsing the pasta after cooking is a bad idea for a couple of reasons. It can cool the pasta and prevent the absorption of a sauce. It can wash away any remaining surface starch, which can work to your advantage at this point in the cooking. But in this recipe, I do not want noodles to absorb the soup and swell).
- Squeeze the water from the noodles and transfer it to a serving bowl.
- Pour hot soup into the bowl with noodles (I would advise you to make your soup, though I used ready-made soup).
- Put fried meat-onion mixture and finely chopped green onion leaves on top of it.
- Thukpa/Gya-thuk is ready to serve hot.
Serves: 4 to 6
For soup
- About 3 litres of clear bone soup or stock.
- Salt – 1 tsp
Thinking Out Loud 