Prawn chow mein with miracle noodles

A while ago, I posted about these so called miracle noodles, known as Shirataki. I mentioned that I thought they were only good for soups and frying them would be a big mistake. I was wrong.

I made a very decent prawn chow mein with these. The texture is similar to tobiko, which is a kind of fish roe, sort of slippery but with a bite, almost a crunch. It's quite an unusual sensation and not to everyone's taste. Also, the noodles smell quite bad when they're first opened, a bit like fermented fish, but some rinsing and a quick boil sorts that out.

I always assumed the noodles would retain their slippery-ness when fried. Not so. They actually get softer the longer you cook them and lose their bite completely, so frying them improves their texture. As I mentioned in my other post they have no discernible flavour at all, but, they do work well at absorbing all the other flavours they are paired with, especially the sauce I made which had some strong soy, oyster and red pepper flavours.

Lots of other noodle based dishes are now open to me. (If I stay within my low carb diet). Japanese Yaki Soba, Korean JapChae, Thai Pad Thai, Indonesian Mee Goreng, (it seems a lot of Asian counties have their own noodle dishes, there's a future blog post there). Of course, some people would say a Yaki Soba is not a Yaki Soba without soba noodles and a Japchae has to be made with the cellophane noodles called dangmyeon, I say, oh well...

Recipe : Prawn chow mein 

1 tbsp peanut oil

1 clove garlic, peeled and chopped finely

1 inch piece of ginger, peeled and finely chopped

1 chili pepper, seeded and chopped finely

4 Swiss chard leaves, stems removed and chopped finely, leaves shredded

4 small or 1 large carrot, peeled and finely sliced

1 handful pink kale or other leafy green, shredded

6 mushrooms, thinly sliced

1 red or orange bell pepper, seeded and thinly sliced

1 tin water chestnuts

6 large raw prawns

1 bag of shirataki noodles, drained, rinsed and boiled for 4 minutes

Sauce

2 tbsp oyster sauce

1 tbsp Chinese wine

1 tbsp soy sauce

1 tsp Sriracha sauce (or other chili sauce)

1/2 - 1 tsp sugar

Heat the oil in a frying pan or wok over high heat and add the garlic, ginger and chili pepper. Stir fry for 30 seconds, then add all the other vegetables and prawns.

Continue to stir fry until the vegetables are softening slightly, but retaining some bite and the prawns are cooked, pink and opaque.

Add the sauce ingredients and stir well to coat everything. Let it cook for a few moments to thicken, then add the noodles. 

Stir fry for a few more moments until the noodles are hot and everything is coated in sauce.