Chicken Udon Noodle Soup Recipe

Chicken Udon (鶏うどん) is Udon noodles and chicken thigh pieces cooked in hot soup.  It is an easy and light meal, but satisfying enough to stand alone.  Chicken Udon is a good food to eat at anytime, but this hot noodle soup is especially delicious in cold seasons.

People in Japan eat Udon usually in hot soup with some meat or vegetables.  At a nice Udon restaurant, an Udon dish could be a more proper meal with a substantial topping like Tempura.  When you prepare Udon at home, on the other hand, it is much lighter fare a lot of time.  You can use any meat or leftover vegetables in your refrigerator.  It’s a quick meal and perfect for lunch.  There are actually Udon restaurants at train stations where people in a hurry just eat and go without even sitting.  It is served literally in a minute, and it can be very tasty fast food.

Udon are noodles made with flour, salt and water.  The best Udon you could have may be home made; however, it might be hard to make it when you want to eat Udon in half an hour.  The next best thing is frozen Udon when it comes to home cooking Udon.  Frozen Udon is actually quite good.  It has the right kind of texture (not too soft) that we really like.  In our video and recipe, we used frozen Udon.  It can’t go wrong cooking frozen Udon.  It is pretty forgiving for overcooking.  Today we can find dried Udon at a lot of US local markets, and that’s fine too.  It is easy to stock up in your pantry and also very easy to prepare (just don’t overcook).  Dried Udon may not be the best tasting Udon, but it is a convenient choice.  If there are Asian markets nearby that sell frozen Udon though, we highly recommend using it.

Although you can use chicken breast, we used chicken thigh meat in the recipe because it is very flavorful from its fat.  If you like beef or pork, preferably thinly sliced, that also works very well.  Throw in your favorite vegetables such as spinach, carrots, and snow peas.  Using this basic Udon soup, you can make many variations of Udon dishes.  If you are tired of basic Udon soup, no problem!  Without changing the recipe you can simply add some flavorings.  Shichimi Japanese chili powder is a basic but popular spice for Udon.  Sudachi, a Japanese green citrus fruit that looks like lime or Yuzu citrus gives a nice fragrance to the dish as well as a sour taste.  For a bolder flavor, chopped ginger root or sesame oil can be added on top of the noodles.  There are unlimited flavor combinations for Udon noodle soup using different ingredients and add-on spices.

Not only is Chicken Udon tasty, but it is so easy to make.  If you have the ingredients for the recipe, your job is mostly done.  It is a one pot dish – put everything in the soup and cook.  When you don’t have time or don’t want to cook, this is the dish for you.  Have a nice bowl of Udon today!

This video and article is newly updated from April 2012.

Print Recipe

4.50 from 14 votes

Chicken Udon Recipe

Prep Time15 minutes mins

Cook Time15 minutes mins

Total Time30 minutes mins

Course: Main Course, Soup

Cuisine: Japanese

Keyword: noodles, soup, udon

Servings: 2 servings

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Ingredients

• 2 pkgs frozen Udon thawed
• 4 cups Dashi
• 1/4-1/2 tsp salt
• 2 Tbsp soy sauce
• 3 Tbsp Mirin
• 2 Tbsp Sake
• 2 chicken thighs cut into bite size pieces
• 4 green onions thinly and diagonally cut
• shichimi hot pepper powder

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Instructions

• Cut green onions thinly and diagonally. Set aside some greener parts for garnish.
• Heat Dashi to a boil. Add salt, soy sauce, Mirin, Sake to Dashi, then add chicken.
• Skim fat and other particles from the surface of the soup if there are any. Add Udon to the soup and let it simmer for 2-3 minutes.
• Put in most of the green onions including white parts, then turn off heat right away.
• Divide noodles and soup into bowls and sprinkle on the rest of the green onions and add shichimi if you like.

Video

Notes

If you like to change the flavor without changing the recipe, you can add some add-ons.  Lemon will give nice sour flavor to the soup.  Chopped ginger root is spicy but refreshing.  Sesame oil adds the distinctive and rich taste to the dish.  Experiment different flavorings to find your favorite!