Persian noodle soup is called Ash Reshteh and tastes nothing like any noodle soup you've had before. It gets its distinct, tangy, and savory flavor from kashk, reshteh, and Persian fried onions. It's also packed with nutritious and flavorful greens, beans, and chickpeas.
2cupskashkUse up to 1-2 cups depending on your preference. See substitutions below.
2quartsstockor water, I use vegetable stock
fresh minta few sprigs, leaves chiffonade, for garnish (optional)
Instructions
Heat ⅓ cup of oil over medium heat. Add both of the sliced onions and cook them until they turn translucent in color. Continue cooking the onions until they are golden brown, rather than just lightly cooked. This can take up to 25 minutes. Remove from the pot and set them aside.
Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in the same pot and add the sliced scallions and cilantro. Cook until wilted and cooked down like you would any greens. Remove from the pot and set aside.
Add 1 tablespoon of oil and the minced garlic to the pot and cook for 1 minute until fragrant. Then add in the beans, lentils, turmeric, and season with salt. Saute them all together for 1 minute.
Add in the cooked greens and mix it all together. Then add in the spinach in 3 batches so it doesn't overflow in the pot. Cook down.
Add in the water or stock. Partly cover the dish and bring the stock to a boil. Let the soup simmer on low for 1 hour.
After the soup has simmered for 1 hour, add 2 ladles of the soup to a bowl with the 1.5 cups of kashk and whisk them to combine. Add this whisked mixture back into the soup.
Break the noodles in half and add them to the soup pot. Stir to make sure they don’t stick together, then reduce the heat back to a simmer. Stir the soup every 10 minutes or so for 30 minutes to keep the noodles from sticking together.
In the meantime, prepare the garnishes for serving: fried onions, stemmed or chiffonade mint, and the rest of the kashk.
Season your soup to taste and serve alongside the garnishes.
Video
Notes
If using dried beans, soak them the night before.Linguini noodles are an OK substitute for the reshteh.You can cook this soup in a slow cooker. Cook the onions and greens in oil as done in this recipe.Sour cream can be used as a sub for kashk. It is the closest in taste, even though nothing quite tastes like kashk.Nutrition facts were calculated using sour cream and general flour noodles because kashk and reshteh were not available in the program that does this calculation.