This ridiculously delicious dish is something probably anyone who has ever eaten at a Chinese restaurant has had before. These Hong Kong Crispy Noodles 港式煎麵 or 兩面黃, also known as Crispy Chow Mein or Hong Kong Style Fried Noodles is a dish of lush contrasts. It features a bottom layer of pan fried crispy crunchy golden browned noodles topped with a savoury stir fry of vegetable and meat/seafood with an extra heaping of soy flavored sauce. That extra heaping of sauce trickles through the crispy crunchy noodles, softening and flavoring some while leaving others still delightfully crunchy.
Savory tender bites of veggies and meat mixed with crunchy bits of noodles...eating these HK Crispy Noodles is so much fun!
The noodles to use for this dish must be able to pan fry up a golden brown. The ones to get are the Hong Kong style egg noodles 港式麵 (also sometimes known as 'chow mein') which are the same ones used for wonton noodles, you know, the thin kinda bouncy textured ones. These dry thin noodles will crisp up perfectly.
These HK style egg noodles are usually sold dried already, and in bundles as you can see in the photo. Shrimp egg noodles, which are egg noodles with shrimp roe, can also be used. You can easily find these sold in the noodle section at the asian supermarkets or buy them online here.
The trick to preparing the dried egg noodles to be pan fried is to cook them just enough to be loosened but still remain their bounce. Definitely don't want to overcook them.
How to do that? Just pour boiling water over to cover and let soak while shaking out the noodle strands. Once completely loosened it's time to immediately pour out the noodles into a strainer.
Once in the strainer give the noodles a good toss to loosen and dry the strands. Your noodles will now look like this. Just cooked al dente noodles. The dryness allows the noodles to crisp up. The dryer the crispier!
Onto the pan frying of the noodles. The first thing is to do is to separate the noodles into two. Smaller amounts makes it easier to achieve the crisp. A bit of oil and pat the noodles cake down and fry at a medium heat. Give it a couple of minutes to golden brown up. Then it's time to flip and repeat the same for the second side.
Tada, the resulting cake of crispy noodles! Golden brown and crispy delicious! Slice the crispy noodle cake in fourths. This makes it easier to eat.
Okay crispy noodles, check! Onto the topping for your crispy noodles. We made ours an all vegetable topping but you could easily riff and add a bit of protein to create HK Crispy Noodles with Chicken or HK Crispy Noodles with Shrimp, etc. See our recipe below for how to add meats to your HK Crispy Noodles.
For our vegetable topping we started with snow peas and carrots. Beautiful accents of fresh green and vivid orange. Keep in mind that stir fry ingredients can be switched up as you like, just try to achieve a nice balance of textures, colors and flavors.
We added lots of mushrooms which in Chinese cuisine is often used as a 'mock' meat due to its strong flavor and meaty texture. We used a mix of different mushrooms - king oyster, enoki, oyster, white and brown shimeji mushrooms and straw mushrooms. Can you tell how much we love shrooms?
It's so cool now in Hong Kong you can buy packs of mixed fresh mushrooms and the price is fabulous! Just look for these packs in the fridge section with the shrooms.
To our medley of vegetable and shrooms we added some quintessential Chinese ingredients that add their own unique texture: the golden needles 金針菜 and the cloud ear fungus 黑木耳.
Golden needles, also known as dried lily bulbs or dried lily flowers or 黄花, are the dried upopened flowers of the tiger lily. They have a floral, woodsy flavor and a chewy texture.
Cloud ear fungus have very little flavor but offer a slippery, crunchy to gelatinous texture that is a pleasant contrast to the softer vegetables. My personal favorite is the more gelatinous texture, oh so yummy! To achieve the different textures cook cloud ears briefly (5 mins) for crunchy texture and longer (20-30 mins) for the softer more gelatinous texture.
One trick to a good stir fry is to parboil the veggies briefly beforehand. Parboiling partially cooks the veggies and releases their juices. All this allows the actual stir fry to be drier, briefer and fiercely hot and thus pumped with wok hei!
Now we're ready for the big stir fry! Keep in mind that stir frying is quick, quick, quick. You're cooking at a high heat so you keep the time short so as to not overcook. Be sure to have everything prepared beforehand including the sauce mixtures so that everything can go into the wok quickly.
A splash of oil into a hot wok, add the aromatics, stir, then add the proteins, once browned flip, then add the parboiled veggies and shrooms, stir. Finally pour in the sauce mixture and give it a good stir or two. Then add in water/starch mixture and stir until sauce is thickened and glossy. Stir fry is done!
Note: For this dish we make an extra lot of sauce. Usually for Chinese stir fries the sauce is quite a bit less.
Pour the hot and piping stir fry with its extra bit of glossy sauce right in the center of your crispy noodles. The extra sauce will soak lusciously into the crisp noodles, softening them here and there, to make them the just right balance of soft and crispy in each bite.
Enjoy your homemade Hong Kong Crispy Noodles 港式煎麵 !
Hong Kong Crispy Noodles Recipe 港式煎麵
Prep time: 15 mins Cook time: 15 mins
Ingredients:
Stir Fry Proteins (if using):
- 7 oz chicken or pork (200g) or 6 large shrimp
Marinade for proteins:
- 2 tsp soy sauce
- 1/2 tsp sugar
- 1 tsp cornstarch
- 1 tsp oil
Crispy Noodles:
- 3 dried HK egg noodles bundles 5oz/135g
- 2 tbsp oil
Stir Fry Sauce:
- 1 1/2 tbsp soy sauce
- 1 tbsp oyster sauce
- 1 tsp sugar
- 3/4 cup chicken stock
- 1 tbsp cornstarch
- 1/4 cup water
Stir Fry Vegetables:
- 2 tbsp oil
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 15 snow peas
- 1 carrot
- 9 oz fresh mushrooms, 250g
- 1 oz dried golden needles 金針菜, 30g
- 1/4 cup dried cloud ear fungus 黑木耳, 1/2 oz/14g
Directions:
Things to Soak: Soak dried golden needles with room temp water to cover. In separate bowl cover dried cloud ear fungus with 2-3 inches room temp water (the cloud ear fungus will expand by a lot.) Let soak for 15 mins. Pour out water. Slice cloud ear into bite sized portions if needed.
Prepare Meats (if using): Rinse and dry chicken/pork. Slice into 1/2 inch strips. Peel shrimp shells and remove veins, then rinse and pat dry with paper towel. Add your choice of protein to marinade of soy sauce, sugar and cornstarch. Mix through. Add oil last and mix through. Let marinade for 10-15 mins.
Make the Crispy Noodles: Put dried noodle bundles into a large bowl and add boiling water to cover. Use chopsticks to shake the noodles loose as they soak. Do this just until the noodles are just soaked enough to separate completely. Remove immediately from water then toss in the strainer to get all the water out. Separate into two equal piles. Note: Don't rinse the noodles with cool water!
Heat up frying pan until hot. Turn heat to medium* and add 1 tbsp oil and spread out one pile of noodles in the pan in a pancake shape. Let pan fry for a couple of minutes, checking the bottom by lifting up with a spatula. When the bottom in golden brown flip and repeat for the other side.
Slice the crispy noodle cake into quarters. Regroup on serving plate, ready to receive the stir fry and sauce.
*Tip: Note that as different stoves run at different heats be careful to check often and adjust your heat as you go to prevent burning. Use lower heat and let the noodles cook slowly.
Prepare the Vegetables and Shrooms: Wash snow peas and carrots. Break the tips off the snow peas and peel off the string connecting the bean's two ends. Peel the carrot then slice into bite size pieces.
Don't wash the shrooms. If needed just use a brush to brush dirt off and slice off the ends. Break the mushrooms into bite sized portions.
Parboil the Vegetables and Shrooms: Heat up a pot of water. Once the water is boiling first add in cloud ear fungus and let simmer for 15 mins. Add in carrots, golden needles and mushrooms and simmer for 5 mins more. Add in snow peas and cook 30 secs more. Remove immediately from heat and pour through strainer. Toss a bit to dry the veggies.
Make the Stir Fry Sauce: In a bowl mix together sauce ingredients: soy sauce, oyster sauce, sugar and chicken stock. In another bowl mix together 1/4 cup water and cornstarch.
Cook the Meat (if using): Heat up a wok to medium heat. When hot add in 1 tbsp oil and then the minced garlic. Stir a couple of secs until fragrant. Lay out the marinated meat or shrimp in one layer. Don't flip, just lift up to check for browning. Once browned to your liking, flip and repeat for other side. Next add in the parboiled veggies as per the next step.
Stir Fry: If using only vegetables heat up wok over high heat and add in 1 tbsp of oil then minced garlic. Stir fry a few seconds then add in the parboiled veggies and shrooms and stir fry for 20 secs. Add in the stir fry sauce mixture and flip and turn for 1 minute. Give the cornstarch and water a good stir up the starch. Add into wok and continue to stir and flip until the sauce thickens up and is glossy. Remove from heat.
Serve the Noodles: Pour the stir fry over the crispy noodles, keeping the pour over the middle and leaving the sides clear. This leaves the side noodles crispy. Serve hot and delicious! Enjoy!
Noodle-licious at The Hong Kong Cookery:
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