Hot Miso Pho

This soup is full of cleansing and cold-fighting ingredients like garlic, ginger and cilantro. By keeping some of the garlic (nature’s antibiotic), and the ginger raw in the bottom of the bowl, you preserve their immunity boosting properties (and get more intense flavour, too!) By adding lots of fresh cilantro at the very end, you can ward off throat and lung infections, since cilantro helps remove metals from the body. The Thai chili will definitely get your nose running (in a good way), and the shiitake mushrooms (B6) and miso (B12) will keep your mood elevated through these dreary winter days. It’s delicious, affordable and quick…What a soup!

Ingredients:

2 teaspoons sesame oil

1/2 an onion, sliced thin

3 large cloves garlic, 2 sliced thin, 1 minced

2 inches of ginger, minced

1 small carrot, julienned

1 stalk of celery, sliced diagonally

2 shiitake mushrooms, sliced thin

1/2 cup broccoli florets

1 Thai chili

Pinch of salt and lots of cracked pepper

Handful of bean sprouts

Lots of fresh cilantro for garnish

1/3 box of spelt soba noodles

1/4 cup miso paste

8 cups of water

Method:

Divide the minced garlic and ginger evenly and place in the bottom of two large soup bowls. Do the same with the bean sprouts. In a medium soup pot, heat the sesame oil over medium heat. Add the sliced onion and garlic and saute till the onions are translucent. Add the sliced Thai chilli. Add 8 cups of water and bring to a boil. Add the carrots, broccoli, celery, mushrooms and soba noodles and turn down the heat a couple notches. Measure out 1/2 cup of the boiling water and mix it well with the miso paste in a separate bowl. When the noodles are done (about 8 minutes), turn off heat and add miso mixture to the pot.

Distribute the soup in the two large bowls over the garlic, ginger and sprouts (there will be some leftover). Top with fresh cracked pepper and lots of fresh cilantro, and serve piping hot. Enjoy!

~The Vegan Project