Chinese Surf & Turf Crunchy Noodles

If I was on death row, this would without a doubt be my last meal. My love for this crispy noodle dish came about at a very young age, when my parents used to take me to Victoria Street in Richmond to get the famous ‘crunchy noodles’. The two of them used to go to this one restaurant (which has now sadly closed) when they were university students, and continued the tradition, taking my younger sister and I to the same place every Sunday for dinner.

To say I am addicted to this dish is definitely an understatement, so given our family institution closed its doors, we had to reinvent the much loved recipe.

It started off with mum stepping up to the plate, but naturally due to my growing love for cooking, I knew I had to try and do my own take on these crunchy Chow Mein. Aside from the obvious crispy noodles being a major draw card for this favourite, the salty and syrupy sauce that soaks up the noodles to make some of them soft is also a massive turn on for me.

Made healthier by frying my egg noodles in the air fryer rather than deep frying, this is an incredibly easy recipe which will come seamlessly to you once you have made it a couple of times. It’s all in the ingredients prep, and then its bam bam thank you mam from there.

Here’s what you need for crunchy noodles. I have separated the ingredients into their respective groupings;

1. Base ingredients (all purchases from Lee’s Asian Grocery) – for the sauce and the crispy noodles; and

2. Meat, seafood and vegetables – these of course can be subbed out for your taste preference, a lot of restaurants use chicken in this dish, as well as normal broccoli and cauliflower if you aren’t into asian greens

Neil’s Meats & Claringbold’s

Fresh Chow Mein from Lee’s Asian Grocery

Ingredients

Sauce

• 1 tbsp oyster sauce

• 2 tbsp Chinese cooking wine (shaoxing wine)

• 1.5 tbsp light soy sauce

• 1/4 tsp sesame oil

• 1 tsp sugar

• Pinch of white pepper

• 185ml chicken stock

• 3 tablespoons cornflour

Crunchy Noodles

• 350g fresh chow mein noodles

• 60ml vegetable oil, plus extra if needed
  

Stir Fry

• 300g porterhouse steak, sliced

• 12 green prawn cutlets

• 8 WA scallops

• 6 Chinese mushrooms

• 30ml vegetable oil

• 4 garlic cloves ,finely chopped

• 1 teaspoon Ginger, grated

• 1/2 White onion, sliced

• 1 carrot thinly sliced

• 1 bunches Gai lan (chinese broccoli) stems and leaves separated with stems cut vertically into sticks

• Fresh baby corn

• 1/2 cup water

To serve

• Fresh chilli

• Spring onion

Method

1. Remove steak from the fridge 1 hour before cooking, then slice.

2. Mix all of the sauce ingredients together in a jug, excluding the chicken stock and cornflour. Remove one tablespoon of sauce and pour over the steak, coating. Set aside to marinate.

3. Coat scallops and prawns in 30ml of vegetable oil and white pepper. Cover and put back in the fridge until ready to use.

4. Mix the cornflour into the sauce well, ensuring there are no lumps.

5. Preheat your air fryer to 150°C. Boil a large pot of water and add the noodles to it. Cook for 1-2 minutes. Drain, and then pour the vegetable oil on top, tossing with chopsticks to coat them well. Add to the pre-heated air fryer and cook for 15 minutes, adding an extra 2 minute frying time if needed. Keep warm in air fryer until ready to serve. (If you don’t have an air fryer, you can fry the noodles in a wok or pan, until crispy).

6. Add vegetable oil to wok or large deep pan. Add the steak, and toss for 1-2 minutes until the outside is brown. Remove from the pan and then add the sliced onions. Stir for 1 minute, until fragrant, then add broccoli stems, mushrooms, baby corn and carrot. Once they begin to soften, add the garlic, ginger and broccoli leaves. Once the leaves have wilted, add the scallops and prawns, carefully tossing for 1 minute. Add the beef back to the pan.

7. Now add the chicken stock, water and sauce. continually stir for 1-2 minutes, until sauce thickens in a syrup consistency.

8. Arrange noodles on a large serving plate in a wreath formation, and then spoon the stir fry on to the middle of the noodles - leaving the edges crispy. Serve immediately with sliced chilli and spring onions.