Spicy Short Rib Peanut Ramen. (2024)

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Spicy Short Rib Peanut Ramen, our favorite winter ramen! Enjoy this on nights when you’re craving your favorite bowl of carry-out ramen, but want something simple and homemade. This ramen is flavored with warm spices, peanut butter, and chili paste. It’s creamy, spicy, and filled with plenty of ramen noodles. Each bowl is topped with kimchi, fresh herbs, nori, and lots of toasted sesame seeds. And best of all, it’s all cooked in one pot – either the crockpot, instant pot, or on the stove. One of our favorite bowls of ramen – even better than a restaurant! Best enjoyed on cold days, because there’s nothing better than a steaming bowl of ramen on a cold winter’s night.

Soup is the name of the game these days, it’s all we’ve been wanting. With the snow falling pretty consistently and many people battling colds, I’ve been making soup after soup. Everything from classic chicken noodle soup to my creamy potato, chili, and then so much ramen. Which I think might be the all-around family favorite.

I’ve made more variations on ramen than I can remember, but if you take a family poll, I think everyone will say that this is their favorite. My brothers especially love this one since I finally used short ribs.

It’s simple as can be to make and so warmingly delicious. Pretty hard to pass up a bowl of this ramen.

The inspiration for this ramen, however, came from my younger brother, Red. He was in Hawaii for Christmas with his girlfriend’s family. He sent me a ton of photos of food from the restaurant they ate at on Christmas Eve. It was a Korean place and it looked absolutely incredible.

The thing about Red is that he doesn’t go into much detail, if any. He sent the photos and said, “this was really good”. I tried to get more out of him, but then he disappeared for the night.

It was obvious from the photo that they enjoyed Korean-style BBQ with kimchi on the side. And that’s when I dreamt up this soup. A ramen with Korean-inspired short ribs in a spicy but creamy broth with lots of kimchi on top.

Different, but it sounded really dish!

The details

You can make this easily on the stove, in the crockpot, or super fast in the instant pot. I’ve made this all 3 ways and each yields the same outcome. I think the crockpot is easiest, but use the cooking method that works best for you.

For the crockpot, layer in the short ribs, then pretty much every other ingredient goes in. The broth, tamari, coconut milk, peanut butter (the not so secret, secret to this ramen), chili paste (I love to use Gochujang – Korean chili paste), shallots, garlic, ginger, a couple of bay leaves, and a cinnamon stick.

Cover and cook low and slow until the ribs are falling apart.

When the soup has finished cooking, preheat the broiler to high, broil the ribs with some of the sauce until caramelized.

While the short ribs broil, add the spinach and ramen noodles to the broth.

As always, I use Brown Rice and Millet Ramen noodles(which you can find at Whole Foods and in many grocery stores). These taste just like real-deal ramen noodles, but they’re much healthier, gluten-free, and vegan.

For toppings, I kept things easy and simple. Lots of kimchi, cilantro, green onion, and sesame seeds. You can add some chili oil too if you like.

Ingredients

▢ 3-5 pounds beef short ribs, bone-in or out, fat trimmed
▢ 8 cups low sodium beef or chicken broth
▢ 1 can full-fat coconut milk
▢ 1/3 cup tamari or soy sauce
▢ 2-4 tablespoons chili paste, to taste (I use Gochujang)
▢ 1/4 cup creamy peanut butter
▢ 6 shallots, sliced
▢ 6 cloves garlic, chopped
▢ 1 tablespoon fresh chopped ginger
▢ 2 bay leaves
▢ 1 cinnamon stick
▢ 3 cups baby spinach
▢ 4-6 squares dry ramen noodles
▢ kimichi, cilantro, and green onion, for serving
▢ chili oil, nori sheets, and sesame seeds, for serving

US Customary – Metric

Instructions

crockpot

1. In the bowl of the crockpot, season the short ribs with pepper. Pour over the broth, coconut milk, and tamari. Add the chili paste, peanut butter, shallots, garlic, ginger, bay leaves, and cinnamon stick. Cover and cook on low for 6-8 hours or on high for 4-6 hours.
2. Preheat the broiler to high. Remove the short ribs from the crockpot and place onto a baking sheet. Break into a few chunks and discard any bones. Broil until caramelized on top, about 3-5 minutes, but watch closely.
3. Meanwhile, crank the heat on the slow cooker to high. Stir in the spinach and noodles and let cook, uncovered, for about 5 minutes. Stir in the short ribs.
4. Ladle the broth, short ribs, spinach, and noodles into bowls. Top as desired with kimchi, cilantro, green onions, chili oil, and sesame seeds. Serve immediately.

Instant Pot

1. In the bowl of the instant pot, season the short ribs with pepper. Pour over the broth, coconut milk, and tamari. Add the chili paste, peanut butter, shallots, garlic, ginger, bay leaves, and cinnamon stick. Seal the lid and cook on high pressure for 60-70 minutes. Quick release the steam.
2. Preheat the broiler to high. Remove the short ribs from the instant pot and place onto a baking sheet. Break into a few chunks and discard any bones. Broil until caramelized on top, about 3-5 minutes, but watch closely.
3. Switch the instant pot to sautè. Add the spinach and noodles and let cook, uncovered, for about 3-5 minutes. Stir in the short ribs.
4. Ladle the broth, short ribs, spinach, and noodles into bowls. Top as desired with kimchi, cilantro, green onions, chili oil, and sesame seeds. Serve immediately.

Stove

1. In a large soup pot set over medium heat, season the short ribs with pepper. Pour over the broth, coconut milk, and tamari. Add the chili paste, peanut butter, shallots, garlic, ginger, bay leaves, and cinnamon stick. Cover and cook over low heat for 3-5 hours or up to all day, adding water if needed to keep the short ribs covered.
2. Preheat the broiler to high. Remove the short ribs from the pot and place onto a baking sheet. Break into a few chunks and discard any bones. Broil until caramelized on top, about 3-5 minutes, but watch closely.
3. To the soup, add the spinach and noodles and let cook, uncovered, for about 5 minutes. Stir in the short ribs.
4. Ladle the broth, short ribs, spinach, and noodles into bowls. Top as desired with kimchi, cilantro, green onions, chili oil, and sesame seeds. Serve immediately.

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