‘Tonkotsu’ literally translates as pork bones. Which is an accurate description of this Japanese dish, which transforms an apparently useless pile of bones into heart-warming, lip-smackingly delicious ramen broth.
Read our interview with ramen expert Ross Shonhan, including his top 5 ramen tips
Any stock bones can be used to make the broth – be it the remains of a Sunday roast or a ham bone stashed away in the freezer. Adding skin and hooves makes it more gelatinous, and bones with meat on them intensifies the flavours.
As ramen expert Ross Shonhan explains, this isn’t the kind of dish which sticks to any rules or follows strict recipes. So even though it is a Japanese broth, we got into the spirit of rule-breaking by using Chinese chilli bean sauce to bring wonderful warmth to this tonkotsu recipe.
Recipe: Tonkotsu Ramen
Serves 8
For the broth
4kg of bones – can include pork, chicken and beef bones
1 onion
1 head of garlic
500g pork belly
For the seasoning
50g Kikkoman soy sauce (roughly 1tsp per person)
40g chilli bean paste (roughly 1tsp per person)
To garnish
6-8 packs of ramen noodles (1 pack of ramen noodles serves 1-2 people)
4 Nitamago (ramen eggs) – allow half an egg per person
6 spring onions, finely chopped
Making the stock
8-10 hours
- Put all the bones in a stock pot, cover with water and bring to the boil.
- Fry the onion and garlic over a high heat until blackened – the gently bitter, caramel flavours enhance the stock. Add to the pot.
- Keep the pot on a rolling boil – and top up the water throughout the day and skimming off any scum that gathers on the surface. The ideal cooking time is between 8-10 hours.
- The pork belly – used to garnish the dish – is best cooked in the broth. Add the to the stock three hours before the end of cooking. It is easier to slice the belly when cold. So if time allows, lay it flat in the fridge for 2 hours before serving.
- Double strain the stock, and either freeze, refrigerate, or serve straight away.
NB. It is difficult to provide exact ‘bone : stock’ ratios. But as a rough guide, we made 5 ½ litres of intensely-flavoured stock from 3.75kg of bones.
To serve
- Add the stock, kikkoman soy sauce and chilli bean sauce to a pan. If you are saving some of the broth for another day, allow 700ml of stock, and 1tsp of soy sauce and chilli bean paste per person.
- Add the noodles three minutes before the end of cooking.
- Finely slice the pork belly, and lay on top of the warming noodles – by the time it the stock has heated, the pork will be warm throughout.
- Ladle the broth and noodles into a ramen bowl, garnish with slices of pork, half a Nitamago egg and spring onions.
