Spring Vegan Miso Soup with Yuba Gluten-Free Noodles

This extra flavorful vegan miso soup has a rich broth fragrant with fresh pureed ginger and scallion. Loaded with spring vegetables, seared mushrooms, and hearty soy noodles, this soup makes a nourishing main dish or flavorful start to a Japanese-inspired meal.

This vegan miso soup recipe has been years in the making! I first discovered this sublime dish in one of my favorite cookbooks Bowl by my friend Lukas Volger. The recipe turns out a richly flavorful and slightly creamy broth that was the best I’ve ever tasted. In January of 2018, Sarah and I made it while on retreat with some blogger friends. We dressed up bowls with a rainbow of colorful vegetables, homemade gluten free ramen noodles, and served it with Sarah’s wonderful tempura on the side.

This year at our annual retreat, we recreated the dish, simplified with protein-rich yuba noodles in place of handmade ones, and served with the most beautiful onigirazu and matcha-glazed black sesame baked doughnuts for dessert. (The recipes for the onigirazu and doughnuts will be coming to Snixy Kitchen, so stay tuned!) Meanwhile I’m so excited to share this vegan miso soup recipe with you, complete with photos shot on our retreat with Erin, Emma, and Amanda using Erin’s fancy artificial lights (could you tell?!)

Ingredients for Miso Soup, Miso Broth, and Dashi Stock

This miso soup recipe starts with a simple stock called dashi. Dashi is traditionally made with bonito flakes, but for this vegan miso soup, kombu seaweed and dried shiitake mushrooms combine with hot water. After a short steep, the richly flavored water makes an umami backbone for the broth.

The next step is to puree fresh ginger, scallions, and miso with some of the dashi plus a hit of salt, rice vinegar, and neutral oil. This puree combines with the remaining dashi stock to make a rich miso base, bright with fresh ginger and scallion, and a little creamy from the miso and oil.

You could add any ingredients you like to this ginger miso broth. Keep it classic with cubed tofu, shiitake mushrooms, and scallions (see this recipe from Snixy Kitchen). Add spring vegetables such as snap peas, asparagus, radish, carrot, bok choy, seared mushrooms, and yuba noodles like I do here. In the winter, try this with broccoli, spinach or kale, cubed winter squash or sweet potato. Or try sweet corn, summer squash, edamame, and halved cherry tomatoes in the summer.

And if you’re wondering about the difference between stock, broth, and soup, it goes like this:

• stock is the clear flavored liquid that happens before broth and soup
• broth is the liquid within a soup that has other solid ingredients in it as well
• soup is the whole shebang: stock, broth, and other goodies

How to Make Miso Soup

Once the dashi stock is made, give the vegetables a quick simmer until they’re crisp-tender. Add the ginger scallion puree and cook until heated through. Since miso is full of probiotics, it’s best not to let it boil in order to preserve their goodness. I like to saute the mushrooms with a little oil and salt until they’re slightly caramelized for extra flavor. Pile the yuba noodles into bowls, pour in the hot broth, and garnish with some fresh veggies for crunch and color. Pass tamari and togarashi at the table so guests can season their own soups.

Is Miso Soup Gluten Free?

Yes, as long as you check your miso ingredients and make sure it doesn’t contain any wheat, barley, or other gluten-full grains. I like South River sweet white miso here, but I’d like to try this recipe with a darker red miso paste and winter vegetables during cooler months.

Is Miso Soup Vegan?

This one is! Many miso soups use bonito (fish) flakes in the dashi stock, but this stock gets its rich flavor from kombu seaweed and dried mushrooms.

Yuba Gluten Free Ramen Noodles: What is yuba anyway?

Yuba ain’t just a river in California. It’s also the name for tofu skin, a collection of proteins that forms on the top of hot soy milk. Yuba is made in shallow trays where hot soy milk is allowed to sit, undisturbed, until a highly desirable skin forms. This skin comes in different grades. When the soy milk is first heated and allowed to form a skin, this makes the highest grade of yuba. It’s soft, rich, and creamy, similar in texture to burrata, and is eaten simply and with minimal seasoning.

The most common grade is the firmer yuba shown here, which is sold in folded sheets. When cut into ribbons, the sheets can be separated into thin, sturdy “noodles” perfect for tossing into salads, soups, or using wherever you would use regular noodles.

I buy Hodo brand yuba sheets from Rainbow Grocery Co-op in San Francisco. You can also find yuba sheets at Asian grocers. Or if you’re feeling adventurous, try making your own.

Vegan Miso Soup = Spring in a Bowl

This soup takes a few different steps, but all come together quickly and easily. Dive into a bowl and you’ll be met with rich, savory broth bursting with umami flavors so melded together, you can’t pick them apart. In each bite you’ll taste succulent, caramelized mushrooms, tender yuba noodles, and a host of spring vegetables. This miso soup is loaded with healing properties from seaweed, ginger, scallion, mushrooms, and veggies. We’ve been eating it to get over a monster spring cold and it’s working wonders.

Vegan Miso Ramen with Homemade Gluten Free Noodles

If you want to up the ramen factor, swap out the yuba noodles for any gluten free noodles you like. Here are our original bowls made with tofu, purple sweet potato, rainbow carrots, and Sarah’s homemade gluten-free noodles.

Looking for more vegetarian ramen and noodle soup recipes? Try these:

• vegetarian miso ramen with rice noodles, roasted sweet potatoes + sesame broccolini
• miso soba noodle soup with roasted tofu and shiitake mushrooms
• vegan coconut curry noodle soup
• green noodle soup with coconut lemongrass broth {vegan & gluten free}
• vegetarian minestrone soup with chickpeas and lemon parsley oil

*Bojon appétit! For more Bojon Gourmet in your life, follow along on Instagram,  Facebook, or Pinterest, purchase my gluten-free cookbook Alternative Baker, or subscribe to receive new posts via email. And if you make this Spring Vegan Miso Soup with Yuba Gluten-Free Noodles, I’d love to see. Tag your Instagram snaps  @The_Bojon_Gourmet  and  #bojongourmet.*

Spring Vegetable Miso Soup with Gluten-Free Yuba Noodles

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This extra flavorful vegan miso soup has a creamy, rich broth fragrant with fresh pureed ginger and scallion. Loaded with spring vegetables, seared mushrooms, and hearty yuba noodles (or diced tofu), this soup makes a nourishing main dish or flavorful start to a Japanese-inspired meal. Adapted from the Ginger Miso Ramen recipe from Bowl by Lukas Volger.

Prep: 30 minutes

Cook: 30 minutes

Steeping Time: 30 minutes

Total: 1 hour 30 minutes

Servings: 4 as a main, or 6 as a side or appetizer

Author: The Bojon Gourmet

Ingredients

Dashi:

• 1 ounce dried kombu (about 8 thin sheets, 3 or 4 inches square each)
• 1 ounce dried shiitake mushrooms (or other dried mushrooms; about 1 cup)
• 8 cups hot water

Miso Broth:

• 1 cup Dashi, from above
• 4 large or 6 smaller scallions, thinly sliced
• Scant ¼ cup (25 g) coarsely chopped ginger root
• 3 tablespoons (60 g) sweet white miso paste
• 2 tablespoons (30 ml) neutral oil such as sunflower
• 1 tablespoon (15 ml) rice vinegar
• 1 teaspoon fine sea salt, more as needed

Soup:

• Remaining dashi, from above
• 1 tablespoon (15 ml) neutral oil such as sunflower, more as needed
• 6 cups thinly sliced trumpet or shiitake mushrooms (450 g)
• 1/2 bunch asparagus
• 1 cup snap peas, slivered (a few pretty halves reserved for garnish)
• 1 medium baby bok choy, trimmed, thinly sliced, washed well
• 8-10 ounces yuba sheets, cut into half-inch thick noodles and separated (soak in warm water for a few minutes if the sheets are hard to separate) or tofu in small cubes
• 1 medium purple daikon radish, peeled and cut into matchsticks (or a few pink radishes)
• 2 yellow carrots, peeled and cut into matchsticks
• tamari (or soy sauce if gluten isn’t an issue)
• togarashi

Instructions

Dashi Stock:

• Combine the kombu, dried mushrooms, and hot water in a large heatproof pitcher, jar, or pot and let stand at least 30 minutes and up to several hours. Drain, squeezing the liquid out of the vegetables; discard the vegetables. Strain through a coffee filter to remove any sand that may have come from the seaweed or mushrooms.

Miso Broth:

• Combine the scallions, ginger, miso, oil, vinegar, and salt in the bowl of a blender. Add 1 cup of the dashi and blend on medium-high until smooth. Strain through a medium mesh strainer to remove any rogue ginger pieces that didn’t get blended.

Soup:

• Heat the oil in a wide saute pan set over medium heat. Add the mushrooms in a single layer and a few pinches of salt. Cook, tossing and stirring occasionally, until the mushrooms are tender and golden, 5-10 minutes. Repeat with the remaining mushrooms.
• Snap the woody ends off of the asparagus and discard. Cut off the pretty tips and reserve. Use a T-shaped vegetable peeler to shave the asparagus into ribbons. (Alternatively, thinly slice the asparagus on the diagonal.) Have the rest of the vegetables prepared.
• Bring the remaining dashi to a simmer in a large pot. Add the sauteed mushrooms and bok choy and simmer until the bok choy is crisp tender and bright green, 2-3 minutes. Add the snap peas and asparagus and cook until crisp tender, 1-2 minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in the ginger miso broth.
• Divide the yuba noodles among serving bowls. Ladle in the soup. Garnish bowls with the radish and carrots. Pass tamari and togarashi at the table so guests can season their own bowls.

Notes

*To style these bowls extra pretty like I did here, blanch each vegetable separately in boiling water and rinse with cool water to preserve their color. Add the broth to the bowl, then arrange the components in each bowl in separate clumps. You may need to pop the bowls in the microwave before serving to warm everything up.

*The dashi can be made several days ahead. The rest of the soup is best prepared close to serving for the brightest colors and flavors, although leftovers keep well for 2-3 days.

Making this? I'd love to see!Tag your snaps @The_Bojon_Gourmet and #bojongourmet!