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Homemade creamy Tom Yum Ramen loaded with tons of tender shrimp, veggies, and a cream tom yum broth base. Add lots of noodles and enjoy this ramen bowl all year long!
Bring you the best, cozy noodle situation.
We’re talking about Tom Yum Ramen.
Yes, as in the classic Tom Yum Goong with chewy ramen noodles all together in one bowl topped with sweet and tender shrimp and of course all the lime wedges you hear desires.
It all started one day when I took to Instagram with my food cravings. I wanted Tom Yum Soup but I also wanted abowl of ramen. And well, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out the outcome.
I’d only had Tom Yum soup at my local Thai restaurant. Honestly, I thought it would be really difficult to make at home. Until, I found out that you can get tom yum paste online.
I haven’t looked back since then.
Now I’m loading my soup to with red bell preps, mushrooms, and Thai chili paste and making this every chance I get!
Ingredients for tom yum ramen
- Shrimp: I like to use shrimpbroth for this. I typically make my own and you can find the recipe here.
- Ginger: a few slices to simmer in the broth.
- Tom Yum Paste: This is my favorite one. I always have some in the pantry.
- Kaffir Lime Leaves: a bag of these will last you a while. Use it in your favorite green curry recipe too!
- Lemongrass paste: I find this in a squeeze tube in the refrigerated section of the grocery store.
- Mushrooms: I prefer baby Bella or white button mushrooms, whatever I can find that day at the store.
- Tomatoes: my favorite Thai joint always had tomatoes in their soup, so I’m accustomed to having it in my ramen too.
- Thai Chili Paste:This is my favorite one. It contains ingredients like dried shrimp, onion, garlic, salt, dried chili, tamarind and sugar.
- Fish Sauce: adds salt and umami to the ramen broth.
- Veggies: I use red bell peppers, but baby corn or anything else you like will work here too.
- Evaporated Milk: is what gives the soup its signature creaminess – seriously don’t make tom yum soup without it!
- Cilantro: adds a little color and flavor
- Lime Juice: gives a bit of acid to make the natural sweetness of the shrimp pop.
- Ramen Noodles: I like to use these noodles, but if you have another brand that you like, feel free to use that instead.
How to make tom yum ramen
- Make the simmering liquid. Bring the shrimpbroth, ginger, tom yum paste, kaffir lime leaves, and lemongrass paste to boil in a souppot. Let it simmer for several minute before you fish out the whole ingredients.
- Make soup. Add the mushrooms, chili paste, tomatoes, red bell pepper, and fish sauce. Then bring to a simmer. Add the shrimp and let them poach gently in the soup before adding the evaporate milk. Taste and adjust with more milk to make it creamier.Turn the stove off and stir in the cilantro. Then add the lime juice to taste.
- Serve it up. Add the prepared ramen noodles to bowls. Top with the prepared soup. You can also add a soft boiled eggs or anything else you like to each bowl.
Other Thai-inspired recipes to try
- Thai Butternut Squash Red Curry
- Garlic Lovers Thai Basil Chicken
- Garlicky Pad See Ew
- Green Thai Mango Salad
- Thai Sweet Chili Salmon Bowls
Creamy Tom Yum Ramen
Ingredients
Broth:
- 3 – 3 ½ cups shrimp broth chicken or vegetable
- 2- inch piece of ginger sliced into 6 pieces
- 2 tablespoons tom yum paste
- 6-8 Kaffir lime leaves see notes
- 3 tablespoons lemongrass paste see notes
Tom yum ramen:
- 6 ounces mushrooms sliced (see notes)
- 3 tablespoons thai chili paste
- 3 tablespoons fish sauce
- 2 Roma tomatoes diced
- ½ red bell pepper diced
- 12 ounces raw shrimp cleaned
- ½- ⅔ cup evaporated milk
- 2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
- 2-4 tablespoons fresh lime juice
- 6 ounces ramen noodles cooked
Instructions
- Simmer: Add the broth ingredients along with 1/2 cup water to a pot and let simmer over medium-low heat for 10-15 minutes. At this point, you can fish the lime leaves and ginger out or just serve around them later.
- Finish: Add the mushrooms, Thai chili paste, tomatoes, red bell peppers, and fish sauce. Let it cook for 5 minutes before adding the shrimp. Add the shrimp then slowly pour in the ½ cup of evaporated milk and let it heat for about 2 minutes. Taste and adjust with more if you want it creamier. The soup shouldn’t come to a simmer at all now, you just want everything to heat through without bubbling. Turn the stove off when you see that the shrimp have cooked and the broth is warm. Stir in the cilantro and start with 2 tablespoons of lime juice. Taste and adjust with more as desired!
- Serve: Add noodles to your bowl and top with prepared tom yum soup. Top with soft boiled eggs, sliced lime wedges, sliced red peppers, more cilantro and anything else you like in your ramen bowl!
Notes
- If you can’t find kaffir lime leaves or lemongrass paste, you can up the amount of tom yum paste to 3 tablespoons. If you can’t find tom yum paste, you can up the Thai chili paste (Nam Prik Pao) to ¼ cup and add a ¼ teaspoon each of onion powder and garlic powder. Be sure to use the kaffir lime leaves, lemongrass, and ginger if you don’t use tom yum paste.
- You can use any kind of mushrooms you like here! Oyster, baby Bella, shitake, and buttons are all great options.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Like This? Leave a comment & rating below!
Have you ever substituted canned coconut milk for the evaporated?
Super fresh and the perfect meal for a cool spring evening! I ordered all of the products you recommended and loved each slurp 🙂
Lime leaves : i see them dried and fresh for sale. Do you think they work equally well in this recipe.
Hi! Fresh lime leaves are the best, so I’d use those if they are available where you live 🙂
thank you for the speedy response
This was a big hit – made it with Sambal Oelek instead the roasted chili paste, and used a lot less for the less adventurous – the rest of us drizzled it on the soup in our bowls. Tomatoes and bell peppers seemed like a weird addition, but they really add so much to the soup! I don’t think the ginger pieces simmer in the broth long enough to make much of a difference and since it is already in the paste, I may skip that next time. Also didn’t add lime juice, since some don’t like it too tangy – the Tom Yum paste I used has quite a lot of tang. That didn’t stop me from squeezing some fresh lime on my bowl.
Made this for the first time and loved it! We added twice the amount of mushrooms, didn’t have the lime leaves so added an extra tbs of tom yum paste. 10/10 !
Have you ever swapped out the evaporated milk for something like coconut milk or coconut cream? I don’t use evaporated milk so wondering what the benefit is?
Hi Autumn! From all my research (and the restaurant I based this recipe on) they use evaporated milk to make Tom Yum soup. Coconut milk is a pretty safe swap, I think it should work out just fine!
Wanted to make this recipe after having something similar in a Thai restaurant. This was almost exactly like what I had if not better. It’s even great leftover a couple of days later. I couldn’t find Kaffir Lime Leaves anywhere, so I used zest from the limes needed for the lime juice. I doubled the recipe as I was cooking for 4 very hungry people. My only recommendation is to add the chili paste one tablespoon at a time. I hit my perfect spice level at 4 tablespoons. If I had doubled the chili paste to 6 tablespoons per the recipe, it would have been too spicy. Overall, a wonderful recipe that I will be coming back to again and again.
So happy to hear you enjoyed it, Brittany! And thanks for sharing your tip about adding the chili paste!
This ramen bowl looks great. It’s so fresh and yummy!