Spontaneous Pork Ramen

As the Chef said after we finished eating, and he couldn't stop exulting: "This is just one of those dishes where you want to eat and eat and eat. You want a little bit of hunger left over at the end of a meal, and you do here, because it's light. But my god, I haven't had anything like this in a long time."

I could eat this at least three times a week.

SERVINGS
Feeds 2

INGREDIENTS
2 cups chicken stock
couple glugs fish sauce
1/2 tablespoon oyster sauce
couple glugs tamari
pinch chile flakes
1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar
3 ounces thin sliced pork
Kosher salt and cracked black pepper
2 tablespoons canola oil
1/2 small onion, fine diced
1 large garlic clove, peeled and thinly sliced
1/2 cup sliced mushrooms, sliced and then julienned
1 baby bok choy, leaves chiffonade, bottom sliced thin
1 tablespoon Thai basil, chiffonade
1/2 package rice sticks
1 tablespoon sliced ginger
1 carrot, peeled and julienned
handful daikon sprouts
1/2 cucumber, peeled and julienned

PREPARATION
1. Heat up the stock in a large saucepan at a medium simmer. Add the fish sauce, oyster sauce, tamari, chile flakes and rice wine vinegar into the stock. Keep it bubbling, at a slow simmer, while you finish the rest of the dish.
2. Season the pork slices with salt and pepper. Bring a large sauté pan to high heat. Get it screaming-ass hot, as the Chef likes to say. Pour in the oil. Put the thin strips of pork in the hot oil. Sear one side of the pork pieces, and then the other. Remove the pork from heat. Drop the pork into the simmering stock.
3. Bring the sauté pan back to medium-high heat. Drop the onions into the leftover oil and goodness from the pork. When the onions have started to soften, put in the mushrooms, garlic and the roots of the bok choy. Cook for 2 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the onion has become soft and translucent. Add the Thai basil. Cook until it releases its fragrance. Spoon all the sautéed vegetables into the stock as well.
4. Bring a large pot of salted water to boil. (The water should taste like the ocean.) When the water is full roiling boil, drop in the rice sticks. Cook about 5 minutes, or until they are soft with a bit of bite left (al dente). Drain the rice sticks. Put them in the fragrant pork and vegetable stock now too.
5. Put the ginger into the stock and bring the liquid to a boil. Taste the broth. Is it what you want? Season with salt and pepper, if necessary, plus any flavorings you feel are missing. Toss in the bok choy leaves and remove the pan from the heat.
6. Divvy up the ramen into bowls. Toss in the julienned carrot. Top with the daikon sprouts and cucumber.