Ridiculously Simple Miso Soup (No Dashi)

Note: this is a recipe I came up with when I couldn’t find dashi. I substituted a couple dashes of fish sauce. I will certainly try dashi once I find it, but I found this recipe to be delicious with the ingredients I had on hand.

Add the miso paste to the water and heat, whisking to dissolve the paste completely. Some recipes call for you to strain the broth after this step, but I don’t. If you don’t want any extraneous grains of miso paste, go ahead and strain once the paste is dissolved.

To toast the nori, pass a sheet over a flame a few times until it turns bright green. I use my gas stovetop flame. Then slice as much as you need and store the rest in a Ziploc for next time.

Once miso paste is dissolved, add nori, tofu, fish sauce (omit for vegetarian version) and chili. And consider adding other ingredients like frozen edamame, rice or cellophane noodles to your soup; add those at this time. Simmer gently for about 4 minutes. Add the green onions and simmer for another minute. Then drizzle with sesame oil and serve.