Recipe: Mushroom and Caramelized Onion Mini Pot Pies

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These mini pot pies filled with caramelized onions and an umami-loaded medley of mushrooms are the thing to make when you want a meatless dinner that is still hearty and comforting. Onions are cooked low and slow while the mushrooms are roasted to concentrate all their flavors, and then they are brought together with a California Chardonnay and a splash of cream before being tucked under a pastry crust. 

This recipe was developed in partnership with California Wines. I will be traveling in Asia for the second half of December and won’t be having any sort of traditional Western-style Christmas feast this year, so while I am at home, I am celebrating the holiday season by making even my weeknight dinners a little extra special. Any time I cook with wine, Spouse and I will open up a bottle that we are also happy to sip; that instant wine pairing that comes from using the same wine in the pan and as in our glasses makes a comfy night staying in feel as special as dining out. We both love an oaky Chardonnay that has creamy or butterscotch-y notes; unlike other whites that might only seem to fit with warmer weather, I think a rich Chardonnay like this works so well all year. Living so close to the California wine country, we’re always stocked up on locally grown wines for little occasions like these and are happy to support local farmers and farmworkers in this way.

The bulk of the filling for these mini pot pies is made with California-grown onions and mushrooms. I’ve lived my whole life in California and one of my favorite things about my home state is its agricultural abundance. I love shopping at farmers markets and local grocery co-ops where so much of the beautiful produce that I see is grown right here in California, and I definitely took advantage of that when shopping for ingredients to make this recipe. The original idea I had for these was combining the flavors of French onion and cream of mushroom soups, but the wine brightens things up and makes the combination taste wholly different from their old-school inspirations. While many pot pies do have a soup-like filling with a lot of liquid, this filling is a celebration of texture from the jammy onions and chunks of mushrooms.

Notes about the main ingredients for Mushroom and Caramelized Onion Mini Pot Pies

• Onions: These will be cooked on low heat in some butter to slowly bring out their natural sweetness. It may seem like a lot of onions when you start, but their volume will reduce significantly, down to about 20% of what you started with. Their jammy texture will make the filling of the pot pies feel rich and thick. 

• Mushroom Medley: In the written recipe below, I note that you’ll need about 1.5 pounds of mushrooms to make the two half-quart pies. I encourage a combination of baby bella mushrooms for their meatiness plus at least one other type of mushroom in order to add flavor and texture complexity to your pot pie filling. I think that the more varieties you use, the more interesting the filling will be, so go for a few different types if you can! I can never resist stopping by the mushroom vendors at farmers markets to see what is grown here in California. To make these pot pies, I used baby bella, shiitake, maitake (hen of the woods), oyster, shimeji (beech), and yellowfoot mushrooms.

• California Chardonnay: A white wine from California with a bright aroma and underlying notes of vanilla, oak, and butterscotch is perfect for tying together the savory-sweet caramelized onions and the earthy roasted mushrooms. Over 80% of U.S. wine is produced in California, so even if you don’t live just a bridge toll away from the wine country like I do, it’s easy to get a great wine from California at your nearby grocer or wine shop, order directly from a winery, or visit a wine bar or tasting room to connect with experts who can help you choose a bottle or two.

• Heavy Cream: Heavy cream helps make the sauce silky and luxurious, and allows it to cling to all the crevices of the roasted mushrooms. 

• Oyster Sauce (or Vegetarian Oyster Sauce): No matter the type of recipe, my Chinese roots have a strong presence in my pantry and my cooking instincts always have me reaching for one of those pantry staples when I am seasoning my dishes. Chinese oyster sauce helps to enhance the natural umami of the mushrooms and brings a little extra savory complexity to this pie filling. If you wish to keep your pot pies vegetarian, there is “vegetarian oyster sauce” which is made from mushrooms and does not actually contain any oysters; it can be used as a substitute for the oyster sauce in this recipe.

• Pie Dough: To keep things easy, I used a store-bought frozen pie dough to make the pastry toppers for my mini pot pies. This recipe is all about making something that feels like comfort food but is uncomplicated enough for a weeknight dinner, and frozen pie dough is one of my favorite shortcuts. Use the pie dough of your choosing and make sure it’s pre-thawed when you are ready to make this recipe. Note that the baking temps and times in the recipe are what I’ve tested with my favorite store-bought dough, but these may vary depending on your dough. Even if you are using a dough that comes pre-rolled, I suggest folding it up into layers and rerolling it out into a size that is just big enough to cover your mini pot pies, for a thicker, heartier crust. You can use the scraps to make decorations for the tops of your pot pies too, if you wish!

How to Decorate Mini Pot Pies for the Holidays

My easy trick for turning any savory baked good into something fit for the festive season is to make a little decoration on top using dill, parsley, and pink peppercorns. I think this works so well because the dill gives the look of miniature fir or pine boughs and the combination of parsley and pink peppercorns resembles miniature holly. Since dill and parsley are soft herbs, they hold up well in the oven; just adhere them with some eggwash so they are in full contact with the surface of the pastry dough and this will keep them from burning up during the bake. I think that adding this simple decorative touch instantly turned these pot pies into a holiday meal.

For a more advanced decoration, you could use some of the pie dough to sculpt little pastry mushrooms to go on top of your pies. If you choose to do this, I recommend to make these pieces ahead of starting the main recipe and keep them in the freezer until it is time to decorate your pies. This will help them maintain their shape and definition when baked. When it’s time, use eggwash to glue the sculpted pieces onto the main pie lid, and don’t forget to give them a brush of eggwash after that so they get nice and shiny.

Decorating is, of course, completely optional! You honestly don’t even need to do an eggwash on top if you don’t have a use for the rest of the egg; the pastry will bake up fine, just not shiny. What’s most important is that they taste delicious, which is exactly what you’ll get with this recipe, even with no decoration at all. I hope you like it, and that it tastes just as yummy and comforting for you as it did for me.

How to Make Mushroom and Caramelized Onion Mini Pot Pies

(Makes 2 half-quart pies)

Ingredients for Pot Pies

1 1/2 lbs mixed mushrooms, cleaned
2 large onions, peeled and sliced
2 tbsp butter
1/2 tsp kosher salt
6 cloves garlic, minced
3/4 cup California Chardonnay
2 tbsp oyster sauce
3/4 cup heavy cream
1/8 tsp cracked black pepper
2 tbsp dill, chopped
1 tsp thyme leaves
1 sheet pie dough, thawed 
Flour, for dusting
< 1 egg, beaten (optional, for eggwash only)

Ingredients for Decorating (Optional, See Decorating Notes Above)

pie dough scraps
dill
parsley
pink peppercorns

---

Procedure

Preheat the oven to 425°F.

Prepare mushrooms for roasting by cutting them down into coarse chunks. For baby bella, shiitake, or button mushrooms, slice them into 1/4-inch pieces. For clustered mushrooms like maitake, oyster, or shimeji, simply pull them apart into similarly sized pieces. Lay mushroom pieces out as a single layer on parchment-lined baking sheets. 

In a large, wide skillet, combine the onions, butter, and salt, and set the heat to medium. Cook for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the onions begin to soften. Then turn the heat down to low and cook for an additional 15–20 minutes, stirring often, until the onions are golden and jammy, and have reduced down to about 20% of their original volume. 

While the onions are caramelizing, dry roast the mushrooms in the oven for about 17–20 minutes. The mushrooms should look wrinkled and feel dry but still be tender, not crisp. Remove from the oven and set aside until it is time to add them to the pan. Set the oven to 450°F*. (*Note: Baking temperatures and timings for prepared pie doughs may vary. Consult package instructions where relevant.)

When onions are reduced, add the garlic to the pan. Keep stirring and cooking the mixture until the garlic becomes fragrant, about 2 minutes. Stir in the wine and oyster sauce. Turn up the heat to medium-low and cook until the liquid has mostly evaporated. Add the roasted mushrooms and cream and keep stirring and cooking until everything is incorporated and excess liquid has evaporated. Stir in the pepper, dill, and thyme, and turn off the heat. Allow the mixture to cool slightly before transferring into mini oven-safe ramekins or cocottes.

On a floured worksurface, prepare the pastry dough. Cut into pieces that will fit over the serving pots and trim as desired. Brush pastry dough with a thin layer of eggwash if a shiny look is desired. If decorating, arrange the decorations on top of the dough lid at this point, using more eggwash as needed to adhere the decorations, then brush another layer of eggwash over the final arrangement. Bake mini pot pies for 20–25 minutes, or until pastry is crisp and golden.

Enjoy the pot pies paired with the same California Chardonnay as was used in the filling!

Thank you so much to California Wines for sponsoring this recipe!

Recipe: Easy Tomato Soup

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As much as I wish it did, soup season does not correspond with tomato season. But it turns out, that’s okay! Because my favorite recipe for tomato soup—one that tastes rich and velvety without any cream and is full of tomato flavor—uses canned tomatoes! Reliable and super-duper easy to make at any time of year, all you need is good canned tomatoes, a blender, and a few other basic ingredients to make that classic tomato soup that goes oh-so-well with a good grilled cheese sandwich (or topped with grilled cheese sandwich croutons)!

Blender soups are obviously my favorite soups to make because they are just so damn easy. And for this recipe, there is something about the onions and butter getting blended together that gives this tomato soup a great creamy texture without pushing the soup into bisque territory. And with a touch of my secret ingredient—fish sauce—to bring some extra umami, it will taste like this soup simmered in a grandma’s kitchen all day when it really takes hardly any time at all to make.

Here are the ingredients you’ll need to make my recipe for this easy tomato soup:

• canned tomatoes: I’ve made this with various brands of canned tomatoes and I am always happy with the results but I will usually go for the San Marzano or San Marzano style tomatoes because they are more dense and have a better tomato flesh to seed ratio. Also note that tomatoes that are packed in puree or a thick puree-like tomato juice will obviously render a thicker, more flavorful soup that the ones where the tomatoes are packed in water. This means you will have to adjust the water-to-tomato ratio a bit as you make the soup, to get the consistency that is to your liking. (After watching this in-depth review of canned tomato brands by Ethan Chlebowski, I typically get the brand Cento.)

• butter: Salted or unsalted is fine. Since canned tomatoes typically come with a considerable amount of salt, there’s not need to fuss over whether your butter has salt in it or not either. This is a recipe where you are going to want to taste for seasoning while you go.

• onion: If I’m lucky enough to find sweet onions at the grocery store, I like to use them when making this soup. But I’ve also made this with regular red onions or yellow onions; any of these will do perfectly well here.

• garlic: Gotta have a little garlic in tomato soup! I usually do about 6 cloves because I love garlic.

• fish sauce: The (not so) secret ingredient! I add fish sauce to any tomato-based soup or sauce I make because I think it really adds an extra depth of flavor and brings out the tomato-y flavors. It will not taste fishy but it will taste delicious.

This soup may be amazingly easy to make but it’s also quite presentable with the help of some little finishing touches. Look at what a glorious blank, vibrant red canvas awaits you below! Some leaves of fresh basil, a drizzle of good olive oil, some cracks of black pepper, or even a little swirl of crème fraîche would make this soup as a much a treat for the eyes as the taste buds.

If you wanna get really crazy, make your favorite version of a grilled cheese and cut it up into little cubes to top your tomato soup with grilled cheese croutons. For the image at the top of this recipe, I made mine with sourdough, white cheddar, gruyere, and a drizzle of sriracha, and used herbed butter to toast/fry it up in the pan.

Note: This recipe makes 2 generous portions that are enough for meals in my household when paired with grilled cheese sandwiches.

How to Make Easy Tomato Soup

Ingredients

4 tbsp (1/2 stick) butter
1 medium onion, peeled and cut into rough wedges
4–6 garlic cloves, smashed and peeled
28 oz can of whole peeled San Marzano tomatoes
water
1/2–2 tsp fish sauce (or to taste)

Optional Garnish Ideas

fresh basil leaves
cracked black pepper
chives
crème fraîche
extra virgin olive oil
parmesan cheese
grilled cheese croutons

Special Equipment

blender

Procedure

In a Dutch oven or study medium-sized pot, gently melt butter on medium-low heat. Add onions and sweat them until they start to become translucent. Add garlic and turn heat down to low, stirring regularly until it becomes fragrant and loses its raw bite but doesn’t brown. Transfer to a blender.

Add the can of tomatoes, including the liquid/puree. Fill the can a quarter of the way with water (about 7–8 ounces) and slosh around to incorporate any remaining tomato residue from the can; add this to the blender as well.

Set the blender to liquify all the ingredients together then return everything to the pot on low heat. If the soup seems too thick, add a small amount of water at a time to get the desired consistency.

Stir in 1/2 teaspoon of fish sauce and then taste for seasoning. There’s a possibility that if you had a lot of salt in your canned tomatoes and/or you used salted butter so you won’t need to season any further. If needed, continue to add fish sauce, a little bit at a time, until the seasoning is to your liking. You won’t need to cook down this soup much after it comes out of the blender, so be sure to taste it at that point and add seasoning to your preference.

Keep the soup on low heat, stirring occasionally, until it’s hot all the way through and starting to bubble or simmer. At this point, it’s ready to serve. Top with your desired toppings and enjoy!

Mini Salmon and Kabocha Squash Pot Pies

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I wrote up a recipe for Kvarøy Arctic Salmon for mini pot pies filled with a creamy, hearty filling of salmon, kabocha squash, and corn. This was inspired by the herring and pumpkin pie from the Studio Ghibli movie Kiki’s Delivery Service. Ages ago, my friend Sandy gave me the idea to try to recreate the fish pastry design from the movie and I finally was able to do a version that I was really proud to share.

I am pretty late to watching all the Studio Ghibli movies. I watched Kiki’s Delivery Service for the first time last year. I happened to be in Stockholm when I watched it, and then found out the next day that the city in the movie was actually inspired by Stockholm! So I got to see one of the buildings that was recreated in the movie right after. Because the experience was so serendipitous, this movie will have a special place in my heart.

You can get the recipe for these pot pies on Kvarøy Arctic’s website.

Slow Cooker Chicken Adobo Ramen

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I grew up hardly knowing my own grandparents across the ocean, and it was just me, my parents, and my sister here in the States. But my parents' host mom—the woman who opened her home to them when they first arrived as immigrants—was from the Philippines and she continued to be a mother figure to my parents and a grandmother figure to me well after my parents got settled. I call her Lola, the Filipino term for a grandma. So even though I am not Filipino, I grew up eating lots of chicken adobo during visits to my Lola’s house.

I remember my Lola's version of chicken adobo being more tangy/vinegary and more brothy than other versions I've had at restaurants as an adult. There was something about that soy and vinegar sauce that was always so appetizing; the kind of thing that you have to reawaken your tastebuds when you don’t think you feel like eating. I felt I could drink it by the bowlful! Which is why I developed this fusion recipe where the chicken adobo braising liquid becomes the base for a noodle soup.

The key steps to making this recipe are:

• Browning the chicken. This renders out the excess fat from the chicken skin, giving you a glorious schmaltz that will be used later.

• Braising the chicken in a slow cooker. I opted to go the slow cooker route to keep the recipe low maintenance. The browned chicken thighs are given a chance to soak up the flavors from a braising liquid made up of soy sauce, vinegar, lots and lots of garlic, and black peppercorns.

• Making the broth. Blending together the strained braising liquid and all that soft garlic creates an emulsified broth that is rich and almost creamy. It has a much more concentrated flavor than a traditional soup ramen.

• Frying the garlic chips. That saved chicken fat goes into making the most delicious garnish of fried garlic chips, which in turn infuses the chicken fat with some of that garlic flavor.

• Frying the egg. Inspired by Filipino silog, I decided this ramen needs to get topped with a beautiful fried egg.

• Boiling the noodles and assembling the bowl. I chose to keep the thigh whole but you can also shred it up before serving if you don’t want the recipients to have to maneuver with the bone.

• Finally, that schmaltzy goodness from before gets drizzled over the whole bowl as a finishing touch at the end.

Click here to get the recipe on the Pete and Gerry’s site!

Thank you so much to Pete and Gerry’s for sponsoring this recipe!

Recipe: Tomato Soup with Pepperoni and Cheese Toast Tops

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So we all know that the very best part of French onion soup is the bread and cheese topper that goes over the soup: that delicious gratinated crostini that forms a lid for you to push through to get to the rest of the contents of the bowl, where the top is covered in a very generous layer of melted cheese and the underside is soaked through with the cozy, soul-warming broth. I learned a new word as I was researching for this recipe, and that word was gratinated—which, according to ol’ Merriam and Webster means “to cook with a covering of buttered crumbs or grated cheese until a crust or crisp surface forms”. Well, why can’t other soups have gratinated toasts as blankets to keep them warm?

They obviously, surely, can and may—and I thought there was no more deserving soup than a simple tomato one. We all already know that tomato soup pairs perfectly with toasted bread and melted cheese, seeing as a grilled cheese sandwich and a bowl of tomato soup has long had a honorary place in the Culinary Couples Hall of Fame. So I decided to take this union to the next level by taking my trusty, amazingly easy tomato soup recipe and give it a melted cheese toastie top. But then my mind went to how tomato soup is basically like a brothy tomato sauce, and how tomato sauce + bread + melted cheese = pizza toast, and how pepperoni and cheese is the ultimate pizza combo…and that is how we ended up here: tomato soup with pepperoni and cheese toast tops.

And it is every bit as good as you might dream it would be.

Some notes about the ingredients for my tomato soup with pepperoni and cheese toppers:

• The base of this recipe is whole peeled canned tomatoes. There are a lot of varieties out there and I have found quite a vast difference in salt content and the natural sweetness of the tomatoes. Therefore, this recipe has lots of notes about tasting along the way and seasoning according to your tastes. You might also notice that whole peeled canned tomatoes sometimes come in purée and other times come in a thin liquid. You will want to add more liquid to the soup if you are using ones that come with a thick purée. Do they really have to be San Marzano style? No. But it is typically what I look for because…just because.

• My go-to way of seasoning any tomato-based sauce or soup is with fish sauce. Trust me on this one. There is something about the acidity of the tomatoes and the salty, funky fish sauce umami that works so well for bringing out the best of tomato flavor. I promise that it won’t actually taste like fish, but instead like tomatoes that have been cooked with love and with some sort of flavorsome mystery ingredient. I am a diehard fan of the Three Crabs brand of fish sauce, by the way.

• Check the size of your bread. You will want something that can lie flat against the surface of the soup inside the soup crock, so that it forms a nice topper over the soup without the edges getting burned. You will also want something nice and crusty, so that it doesn’t completely disintegrate the moment it is placed on top of the soup. You’ll be toasting it first, and then putting it on top of the soup, and then melting the cheese over it under the broiler.

• Use the type of cheese that works for you but make sure it’s freshly grated. Any semi-hard white block cheese should work well for this; I used a young gouda but you could go with mozzarella or pay homage to the French onion soup inspiration with gruyere. Any cheese you associate with melting. But be sure to grate it yourself instead of using the pre-grated stuff in order to get a nice cohesive consistency.

• And finally, how do I turn pepperoni into those iconic, inviting little cups of grease? I get a whole stick of pepperoni in natural casing and slice it myself. This article on Serious Eats goes into detail about what type of pepperoni gets cuppy when cooked. I used Boar’s Head Natural Casing Traditional Pepperoni and it has always served me well. (Shoutout to my friend Peggy for pointing me in the right direction on this.)

That all being said, this recipe is so dang flexible. Skip the pepperoni if you want. Use a few tiny baguette slices instead of one slice of toast covering the whole top. Use a damn boxed tomato soup if you really must. At the end of the day you are talking about tomatoes, bread, cheese, and some fire magic to melt it all together, and (as long as you are being safe about that fire bit) you’re gonna end up with something good.

How to Make Tomato Soup with Pepperoni & Cheese Toast Tops

Ingredients for Soup

1/4 cup butter
1 medium sweet onion, peeled and cut into wedges
6–8 garlic cloves, peeled and smashed
1 28-oz can of whole peeled San Marzano tomatoes*
1–2 tsp fish sauce
1–2 tsp sugar (optional)
cracked black pepper, to taste (optional)

Ingredients for Toast Toppers

2 small slices crusty bread**
1+ cup freshly grated cheese, such as young gouda, gruyere, monterey jack, or mozzarella
8–12 slices pepperoni with natural casing
herbs for garnish, such as basil, thyme, or oregano

*If using “tomatoes in purée”, see extra note in Procedure.
**Check that the bread slices fit within your soup crocks in order to form a “topper” over the soup

Procedure

In a medium dutch oven or pot, melt butter on medium-low heat. Add onions and sweat until they turn translucent and edges are beginning to caramelize. Add garlic, turn heat down to low, and stir regularly until garlic is fragrant and starts to turn golden. Add can of tomatoes.

Scrape up any bits stuck to the pot and carefully transfer contents of pot to a blender. Add 3/4 cup water (or, if using “tomatoes in purée” add 1 1/4 cup water). Blend until liquified, then pour back into pot.

Stir in 1 teaspoon of fish sauce. Check for seasoning. If soup tastes a bit weak in tomato flavor, add 1 to 2 teaspoons of sugar.

Simmer uncovered on low, stirring occasionally, until soup is heated through and starts to bubble or simmer. Check for seasoning again and add additional fish sauce or sugar as needed. Season with black pepper if desired. Cover and keep warm.

Lightly toast slices of bread with your preferred method of toasting.

Spoon soup into 2 oven-safe soup crocks. Top each with a piece of toast. Divide cheese between the two toasts.

Position an oven rack so crocks can be close to the broiler flame. For easy transportation, place crocks on a sturdy sheet pan before positioning under broiler. Watch carefully while broiling. Broil until cheese just starts to melt, then top cheese toasts with pepperoni and continue to broil until cheese is completely melted and pepperoni has curled up to form cups. (Alternatively, you could follow these same steps using a kitchen blowtorch instead of a broiler if you make sure to move the torch around to distribute heat evenly.)

Remove soup crocks and garnish with fresh herbs before serving.

One last reminder about safety…I consider this recipe to be pretty easy but it does involve FIRE. Whether you choose to use your oven’s broiler setting or a blowtorch, keep a close watch on your precious soup toppers. Once the cheese starts to melt, you’ll be surprised how quickly it can die a charred death under an unsupervised broiler. Use oven-safe containers. Don’t let your bread catch on fire. Basically, you don’t want yourself or your culinary creation to end up like Andy:

Image via @foone on Twitter, from Apple’s Oregon Trail

Chicken Ramen with 40++ Cloves of Garlic

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Ramen broth is one of those things that I think is less about strictly following a recipe, and more about following your heart. And my heart led me to this idea for turning the French classic “chicken and 40 cloves of garlic” into a ramen. So, be warned that what follows is just a loose guideline moreso than a recipe.

Ina Garten’s Chicken with Forty Cloves of Garlic was the first (only?) French “fancy” dish that I made regularly when I started cooking in college. Is it even fancy? It feels more like countryside/provençal vibes to me in hindsight but it felt very luxurious then. Back then, I also skipped the cognac and used two-buck Chuck for the white wine, which honestly still sounds perfectly good to me now. While other college kids were eating Top Ramen, I was ditching class and learning how to cook by watching hours and hours of the Food Network, seduced by the soothingness of Ina Garten’s voice. So, this recipe is a tribute to that time in my life.

How I even came up with the idea to turn this French chicken and garlic dish into ramen in the first place was when I came across Mandy Lee’s Vampire Slayer Ramen recipe, but I think you will find that these renditions of ramen are quite different from one another.

This awkwardly vague recipe should guide you to a very subtle, creamy broth that is naturally sweet from the braised garlic and some satisfying fall-of-the-bone wings that provide bites of umami as you slurp. As is a common practice with these creamy broths, I tried a version with Asian style unsweetened soy milk but did not notice it making much impact in taste or texture, so I left it out below. I kept the seasoning quite minimal, adding just enough salt to make the other flavors known, but you may find that a little drizzle of soy sauce might make things more in line with the saltier restaurant ramens you are used to.

One more thing I need to tell you about this, though, is that I experienced some pretty rowdy stomach noises in the 24 hours that followed. The kind that made me google “does garlic make you gassy”. (Spoiler alert: It does.) In my opinion, a small price to pay to indulge in a garlic lover’s noodle bowl dream. But you have been warned.

How to Make Chicken Ramen with 40++ Cloves of Garlic

Ingredients for the broth

6–8 party wings, flats recommended
salt
butter
40–50 cloves of garlic, peeled
1/2 onion
shao xing wine
24 oz high-quality bone broth
thyme
miscellaneous food scraps
soy sauce, to taste

For the Bowl

2 servings of fresh ramen noodles
5 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced
neutral oil
2 ramen eggs, plus a few spoons of marinade*
other garnishes, such as black garlic, seaweed snacks, sliced scallions, pea shoots (optional)

*I have found this recipe very helpful for making ramen eggs.

Procedure

To make the broth: Season wings all over with salt. In a large dutch oven, heat a generous knob of butter. Add chicken wings and brown on each side, lowering the heat as needed to avoid burning too quickly. Remove browned wings and add garlic and onion. Cook until they begin to caramelize, then deglaze the pot with a splash of shao xing wine. Add bone broth, a few sprigs of thyme, and whatever food scraps you have around for making stock (such as onion skins, carrot peels, bones, skin, etc). Return the wings to the pot. Cover and simmer on low until the wings are tender, then remove the wings and set aside.

Continue simmering the broth as desired, until the garlic cloves are mushy and it tastes naturally sweet from the aromatics. Remove thyme stems and any inedible food scraps. Transfer the remaining contents of the pot into a blender and carefully blend until completely smooth. (Please exercise caution when blending hot liquids, and allow the liquid to cool a bit first if you have time.) Return broth to the pot and season to taste. Keep warm on low heat while preparing the rest of the ramen bowls.

To make the wings: Bring some of the marinade from the ramen eggs to a simmer in a small pan. Add the cooked chicken wings and cook in the marinade, flipping occasionally, until the wings look flavorfully glazed and most or all of the marinade has evaporated.

To make the fried garlic chips: Spread the thinly sliced garlic out evenly in a small pan and add enough oil to cover. Fry on medium low to low heat until the garlic starts to turn golden brown (watch carefully). Remove pieces as they brown and transfer to a paper towel. Reserve the garlic-infused oil when the frying is complete.

To assemble: Cook noodles and divide between 2 bowls. Top with wings and egg, then pour in the broth from the side. Garnish with garlic chips and any other toppings. Drizzle some garlic-infused oil over the top.