Add A Bold Twist To Your Ramen With This Taco Ingredient

Savory ramen is the perfect dish when you're looking for a cozy, slurpable meal. The dish we enjoy today originated in Japan, and besides noodles and broth, it often includes meat and other add-ons like fermented vegetables. Ramen can be customized however you want — many people enjoy anointing their bowls with everything from finely chopped scallions to pickled ginger and black garlic oil — but if you're looking to give the soup a massive flavor boost, try adding Mexican birria to the mix. Between the seasonings in the broth and its slow-simmered meatiness, you'll have a luxuriously rich fusion meal you won't want to put down.

Like barbacoa, birria is a dish that refers to a Mexican cooking style rather than a type of meat. The red chile stew was first created in Jalisco, Mexico as a way of making goat meat tender. Eventually, the method made its way to other parts of the country like Tijuana, and then the United States, where beef became the meat of choice due to its wider availability. Combining ramen and birria, however, seems to have first gained traction in Mexico City. If you want a low-effort dish with a big taste payoff, you can buy your birria at a grocery store like Trader Joe's or repurpose leftovers from your favorite restaurant. However, if you want that true from-scratch flavor, it's surprisingly easy to make birria in all its aromatic and vividly hued glory at home for use in your next bowl of noodle soup.

Ramen is most commonly served in broth, and birria is served with consommé, a complex broth layered with numerous ingredients. That concentrated, clarified stock, deep with flavor from the meat slow-cooking for hours, can replace the typical broth you would find in your ramen bowl, often dashi or tonkotsu broth. (Dashi is a plant-based broth made with seaweed while tonkotsu is a meat-based broth made with pork.) Birria consommé is full of herbs and spices like oregano and peppers, including ancho and guajillo chiles, so the soup will have some fiery heat, unlike tradition ramen broth. While beef is a favorite for birria, you can also use stew-friendly cuts of lamb, like the shoulder or shank, to differentiate the flavor from chicken or pork-based ramen broths even more.

Chuck roast and other tough cuts are the best choice for birria since it takes time to tenderize them. Once the meat is fall-apart tender, it can be added to the ramen in place of or even alongside the Japanese soup's traditional accompaniment of chashu pork. Either way, you should remove the meat from the consomme, shred it for easy consumption, and place it in your bowl with the cooked noodles before pouring in your broth. From there, you can add other complementary garnishes. Many people like soy-marinated eggs with their soft yolks; you can also look to your favorite taco accompaniments like cilantro, raw sliced onions, and a squeeze or two of lime.