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15-Minute Tom Yum Noodle Soup - not packaged ramen, but made from scratch, super EASY Thai Tom Yum Ramen. So GOOD!
Who knew that Tom Yum Soup takes only 15 minutes to make?
Yep, you heard it right, it takes as little as 15 minutes to make Tom Yum Soup, or in this case, Tom Yum Noodle soup, which is one of my favorite lunch dishes during week days.
Like any busy moms, I don’t have a lot of time during the day.
And when it comes to lunch, I have a list of quick and easy, 15-minutes lunch recipes that I always resort to: cold soba noodles, soba noodles soup, various variations of fried rice, and this Tom Yum noodle soup.
Many people think that Tom Yum, or Thai spicy and sour shrimp soup is too intimidating or hard to attempt at home.
In reality, it’s about the easiest Thai recipe to prepare, provided you have the ingredients.
To make Thai cooking at home, you ought to stock up the essentials, especially: nam prik phao (Thai roasted chili paste), fish sauce, palm sugar, lemongrass, kaffir lime leaf, and lime juice.
As I am a huge fan of Thai food, they are always in my pantry or fridge.
If you don’t have these ingredients, I strongly urge you to stock them up as you can make endless Thai dishes with these staples.
One pointer about making quick lunches is to multitask.
I always do 2 or 3 things at the same time.
I will boil the noodles while prepping the ingredients.
And while I wait for my soup to cook, the noodles would be done.
Try this recipe and practice multitasking in the kitchen and a good and delicious weekday lunch is 15 minutes away.
Frequently Asked Questions
This recipe is only 30 calories per serving.
What To Serve With Tom Yum Noodle Soup
For a wholesome meal and easy weeknight dinner, I recommend the following recipes.
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15-Minute Tom Yum Noodle Soup
Ingredients
- 1 roll soba noodles/egg noodles or instant noodles
- 1 1/4 cups water
- 1 stalk lemongrass, white part only, pounded and bruised
- 5-6 kaffir lime leaves, bruised
- 4-5 slices fresh galangal
- 1/2 small tomato, cut into 3 to 4 wedges
- 6 medium-sized shrimp, shelled and deveined
- 6 straw mushrooms or fresh oyster mushrooms, cut into halves
- 1 1/2 tablespoons Nam Prik Pao, Thai roasted chili paste
- 1/2 tablespoon fish sauce or to taste
- 3 dashes chili powder
- 1 1/2 tablespoons lime juice
- cilantro leaves, for garnishing
Instructions
- Prepare the soba or egg noodles according to the package instructions, which usually take about 5 minutes to cook. Drain the noodles, rinse with cold water, and set them aside in a serving bowl.
- At the same time, bring 1 1/4 cups of water to a boil in a small pot. Add all the aromatics, followed by the shrimp, mushrooms, and nam prik phao. Continue boiling until the shrimp is cooked through. Add the fish sauce and chili powder, then turn off the heat and stir in the lime juice to combine.
- Pour the Tom Yum soup over the noodles and top with cilantro leaves. Serve immediately.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Nice recipe and impressive. You are using the chili paste and powder to give your soup the red color. And I don’t have to make this know this is a winner.
When I visit a new restaurant with Tom Yum on the menu, the first question that I ask is, Do you make your Tom Yum with a paste?” If am told yes, I will usually steer far away from this soup. This is a hard lesson I learned, as some restaurants use too much paste and make the soup oily to too oily to enjoy.
At home, as I make the soup broth, I like to take a long taste to check the balance. Often, I’ll add some paste [ Maesri – lower salt ] at the end, maybe a half teaspoon per serving to fill in flavors or bring it up to strength. This way, I keep the oil level to nothing or very low.
For those that don’t like the Tom Yum paste, check out the Maesri brand. Their Tom Yum paste is great because it has lower salt and no msg as compared with other brands.
As for noodles, I like rice noodles – anything from vermicelli to Pho and they all work fine in this soup.
Lastly, as I have a hard time getting galangal, I substitute ginger slices. While these are not direct substitutes, the ginger definitely helps the soups.
Forgive me for not actually making your recipe and commenting.
Awesome thanks for trying my recipe!
After posting my comments, I did follow your directions and make the soup.
Had to make following substitutions:
Powdered Lemongrass rather than fresh Lemongrass
ginger rather than galangal
Pho rice noodles
Chinese chili oil for Nam Prik Pao
No Kaffir leaves.
To keep the soup from becoming oily, I used scooped out more chili’s and drained off oil.
At final tasting, added a bit of sugar to help balance the flavors.
Results: Nice. Many thanks. The touch of red pepper at the end is appreciated.
Nice recipe and impressive. You are using the chili paste and powder to give your soup the red color. And I don’t have to make this know this is a winner.
When I visit a new restaurant with Tom Yum on the menu, the first question that I ask is, Do you make your Tom Yum with a paste?” If am told yes, I will usually steer far away from this soup. This is a hard lesson I learned, as some restaurants use too much paste and make the soup oily to too oily to enjoy.
At home, as I make the soup broth, I like to take a long taste to check the balance. Often, I’ll add some paste [ Maesri – lower salt ] at the end, maybe a half teaspoon per serving to fill in flavors or bring it up to strength. This way, I keep the oil level to nothing or very low.
For those that don’t like the Tom Yum paste, check out the Maesri brand. Their Tom Yum paste is great because it has lower salt and no msg as compared with other brands.
As for noodles, I like rice noodles – anything from vermicelli to Pho and they all work fine in this soup.
Lastly, as I have a hard time getting galangal, I substitute ginger slices. While these are not direct substitutes, the ginger definitely helps the soups.
Forgive me for not actually making your recipe and commenting.
Okay, after making the various adjustments due to shellfish allergies, this soup came out SOOOOOO GOOOOD. I was so proud, I jumped back and kissed myself……just like James Brown. Mmmmmmm…… Also the Soba noodles were so much lighter than wheat noodles. Must use them more often. Thanks so much for a great recipe that will be a staple in my home.
Thanks Kazy for trying this Tom Yum noodle soup recipe.
I found Korean Hot pepper paste Gochujang in my refrigerator. Will that suffice for Nam Prik Pao or not so much?
Not so much. Totally different.
Bummah. Couldn’t find this anywhere in the Asian stores around my neighborhood, 99 Ranch or San Gabriel Superstore, at least nothing I could understand as everything was written in various Asian languages. I even asked some people for help but was still unsuccessful. I googled it and found the Nam Prik Pao on-line but I discovered much to my disappointment that unfortunately one of the ingredients is shrimp and since my wife is allergic to shellfish I will have to forego this necessary ingredient and just throw in a bunch of chili peppers instead. Maybe add some garlic, shallots, sugar and tamarind paste.
Allergic to shellfish. Can you recommend a substitute?
Chicken
Finally a tom yam recipe which doesnt require the paste! thank you sooo much, been hunting for one for quite some time and yours looks super easy. Have followed several of your recipes and none of them have failed me yet. Thank you so much :)
My family eats nam prik pao like it’s ketchup. I look forward to making this soup.
Yes Nam Prik Pao is awesome I love it, too. :)