Hot Dry Noodles

Noodles boiled the day before, oiled and cooled on a tray, then reheated in ten seconds and tossed with sesame paste and no broth at all.

Vegan.

Ingredients

The noodles

• 500 g fresh alkaline wheat noodles
• 3 tablespoons sesame oil

The sauce

• 6 tablespoons sesame paste
• 4 tablespoons light soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons water, to loosen
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 4 cloves garlic, crushed with 2 tablespoons water

On top

• 100 g pickled radish, finely diced
• 60 g pickled long beans, chopped
• 4 spring onions, sliced
• chilli oil, to taste
• white pepper

Method

1. THE NOODLES ARE COOKED THE DAY BEFORE, OILED AND COOLED, and that is the whole dish rather than a convenience. Boiled to just short of done, spread out on a tray, turned through sesame oil and left to go cold, they dry slightly and firm up. The next day ten seconds in boiling water brings them back, and they come out springy and separate in a way freshly boiled noodles never are.
2. AND THERE IS NO BROTH. Not a little, none: it is called dry and it means it. The sauce is thick sesame paste loosened with soy, and the only moisture is what clings to the noodles. A spoon of stock turns it into a different and much worse dish.
3. Day one. A large pan of water at a rolling boil. Noodles in, loosened at once with chopsticks, and boiled 90 seconds -- less than the packet says. They should still have a firm core.
4. Drained and spread in a single layer on a wide tray. Not piled; piled, they steam each other and go soft.
5. Sesame oil poured over and turned through with the hands while they are still warm, lifting and separating until every strand is coated and glossy.
6. Fanned until cool -- a fan, a draught, or just time. Left uncovered at room temperature a few hours, or covered in the fridge overnight.
7. Day two. Sesame paste stirred with the soy, sugar and water until it is the thickness of double cream. Sesame paste seizes and goes grainy when liquid hits it fast, so add the soy a spoonful at a time and keep stirring.
8. Garlic crushed and steeped in its water 10 minutes, then strained -- the water goes in, the solids do not.
9. A pan of water at a hard boil. Noodles into a sieve, the sieve lowered into the water for 10 TO 15 SECONDS ONLY, shaken once, lifted out. Any longer and the day's work is undone.
10. Straight into warm bowls, sauce over, then the pickles, spring onion, chilli oil and a hard grind of white pepper.
11. Tossed immediately and eaten immediately. It stiffens within a few minutes and does not sit.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under China · All recipes