Sarra Ina Garten’s chicken ramen noodle soup is a fast, flavorful chicken soup made with roasted chicken breast, ramen noodles, baby bok choy, fresh ginger, garlic, soy sauce, and 10 cups of homemade chicken stock. The chicken roasts while you build the broth, so the whole thing comes together in about 1 hour 15 minutes and serves 6.
This recipe comes from Go-To Dinners, Ina’s most recent cookbook. She came up with it during the pandemic after stocking her pantry with ramen noodles and realizing they made “an easy and delicious addition to chicken soup.” The ginger and baby bok choy push it away from a basic American chicken noodle soup and toward something with real depth, but without the complexity of a restaurant-style ramen.
The bok choy goes in two stages, and skipping this will cost you. The stems get sliced and simmered in the broth for 2 to 3 minutes so they turn tender. The leafy tops go in off the heat so they barely wilt and keep their bright green color. Dump everything in at once and the leaves turn gray and slimy while the stems stay crunchy.
Ina Garten Chicken Ramen Noodle Soup Recipe
Course: Soups4
servings30
minutes40
minutes300
kcalA pandemic pantry discovery that became a weeknight staple in Ina’s Go-To Dinners cookbook. Roasted chicken, fresh ginger, and baby bok choy give cheap ramen noodles a serious upgrade. Use leftover roast chicken and it comes together even faster.
Ingredients
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2 split (1 whole) chicken breasts, skin-on, bone-in
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3 tablespoons canola or vegetable oil, plus extra for the chicken
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3 tablespoons canola or vegetable oil, plus extra for the chicken
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Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
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1 1/2 cups chopped yellow onion (1 large)
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2 cups 1/2-inch-thick sliced carrots, scrubbed (3 to 5 carrots)
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2 cups 1/2-inch-thick sliced carrots, scrubbed (3 to 5 carrots)
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3 tablespoons peeled and minced fresh ginger
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1 tablespoon minced garlic (3 cloves)
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10 cups (2.4L) simmering chicken stock, preferably homemade
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1 tablespoon soy sauce (such as Kikkoman)
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1 (3 oz / 85g) package ramen noodles (discard the flavor pack)
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8 oz (225g) baby bok choy, leaves separated, trimmed, and cleaned
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6 scallions, white and green parts, trimmed and sliced diagonally
Directions
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Roast the chicken: Preheat the oven to 350F (180C). Place the chicken on a sheet pan skin-side up, rub with oil, and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Roast for 30 to 40 minutes, until cooked through. Cool slightly, discard the skin and bones, and shred the meat into large pieces.
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Build the broth: While the chicken roasts, heat the oil in a medium pot or Dutch oven over medium-low heat. Add the onion and sauté for 6 to 8 minutes until tender. Add the carrots and sauté 5 minutes. Add the ginger and garlic and sauté for 1 minute until fragrant.
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Simmer the stock: Pour in the simmering chicken stock, bring to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer for 10 minutes.
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Add the chicken and noodles: Add the shredded chicken, bring back to a simmer, and stir in the soy sauce. Taste for seasoning. Add the ramen noodles. Cut the bok choy in 1/2-inch-thick diagonal slices and add just the stems to the soup. Simmer for 2 to 3 minutes until the noodles and bok choy stems are tender.
- Finish off the heat: Remove the pot from the heat and stir in the bok choy leaves and scallions. Serve hot.
FAQs
Why does Ina throw away the ramen flavor packet?
The seasoning packet is mostly salt, MSG, and powdered flavoring designed to turn water into broth. Ina already has 10 cups of real chicken stock doing that job, so the packet would just add a harsh, artificial edge on top of a broth that’s already rich.
The ramen noodles themselves are what matter here. They cook in 2 to 3 minutes, soak up broth beautifully, and have a chewier texture than regular egg noodles. It’s the noodle, not the packet, that makes this soup different from a standard chicken noodle.
How is this different from Ina’s classic chicken noodle soup?
Her Chicken Noodle Soup in Family Style is a straight-ahead American version: egg noodles, celery, carrots, parsley, and chicken stock. No ginger, no soy sauce, no bok choy. It’s comfort food in its simplest form.
This ramen version has an Asian-inspired backbone from the fresh ginger, soy sauce, scallions, and bok choy. The broth tastes warmer and more complex because of the ginger, and the bok choy adds a fresh crunch that egg noodles and parsley can’t match.
Can you use store-bought rotisserie chicken?
A rotisserie chicken works perfectly and saves 40 minutes. Shred about 2 cups of meat from the bird, skip the roasting step entirely, and add the shredded chicken directly to the simmered broth.
Ina suggests using leftover roast chicken in the cookbook as a shortcut she calls a “Two-fer.” The rest of the recipe stays exactly the same. Just make sure you add the chicken after the stock has simmered with the aromatics for 10 minutes so the ginger and garlic flavor the broth first.
What kind of ramen noodles should you buy?
Any standard 3 oz package of instant ramen works. The brand doesn’t matter because you’re throwing away the seasoning packet anyway and only keeping the dried noodle block.
If you want to upgrade, fresh ramen noodles from an Asian grocery store have a better chew and slightly more flavor. They cook in about the same time. Don’t use thick udon or rice noodles because they change the texture of the soup entirely and absorb too much broth.
Does this soup store well?
The broth and chicken store fine in the fridge for up to 3 days, but the ramen noodles are a problem. They absorb liquid as they sit and turn bloated and mushy by the next day.
Ina’s own make-ahead tip is to build the soup through the stock-and-chicken stage and stop there. When you’re ready to eat, reheat the broth and add the noodles, bok choy, and scallions fresh. That way the noodles stay springy and the bok choy keeps its color. Freezing works the same way: freeze the base, add the fresh ingredients after thawing and reheating.
