Slow Cooker Vegan Ramen

We are finishing off our slow cooker series with a tasty one – Slow Cooker Vegan Ramen! Throw out the instant ramen and make this one instead. It is packed with veggies, tofu and a delicious broth. You can make this on a Sunday and have cozy dinners all week.

Step One: Prep the Ingredients

A lot of the flavor of the broth comes from mushrooms. I used two different types of mushrooms to add flavor to the broth and texture to the ramen – shiitake & Hon-Shimeji (or brown beech mushrooms).

You will also need:

• yellow onion
• garlic
• carrots
• super firm tofu 
• broth
• low sodium soy sauce
• rice vinegar
• sesame oil
• ground ginger
• bok choy – we won’t add this until the end

Step Two: Cook it Up

Add everything to the slow cooker (through the ginger) and cook it on high for 4 hours or low for 8 hours. While the ramen is cooking the broth is going to take on a super earthy flavor from the mushrooms. And everything else will absorb that flavor.

Once the veggies and broth are done cooking, it is time to cook the bok choy and the noodles. Now when it comes to the noodles:

• I used chuka soba noodles (basically, Japanese soba noodles). These cook extremely quickly in the broth, but if you aren’t planning to eat all of the ramen in one sitting, I would cook the noodles separately and add them to each bowl. Otherwise you’ll end up with a mushy mess.
• You can really use whatever noodles you want. You could even buy some instant ramen and ditch the seasoning packet.

You can just add the bok choy directly to the broth and it should wilt in about 1 minute.

Step Three: Serve

Once the noodles and veggies are cooked, it is time to serve this up. Grab your favorite ramen bowl and ladle the broth, noodles and veggies into it.

When it comes to serving, I like add green onion, sesame seeds and some chili oil. You could also add a dash of sesame oil if you don’t like spice.

Tips & Tricks

I used vegan chicken broth which has a TON of flavor. I recommend using what I did (linked in the recipe card). Most traditional veggie broths lack flavor, so if you use veggie broth, you will need to compensate for the lack of flavor. You can do this by adding more soy sauce or miso.

If you are sensitive to salt you can use a mix of broth and water. I used 6 cups of vegan chicken broth and 2 cups of water.

I used chuka soba noodles (basically, Japanese soba noodles). These cook extremely quickly in the broth, but if you aren’t planning to eat all of the ramen in one sitting, I would cook the noodles separately and add them to each bowl. Otherwise you’ll end up with a mushy mess.

You can really use whatever noodles you want. You could even buy some instant ramen and ditch the seasoning packet.