Chinese Malaysian Style Hokkien (Fujian) Noodles Recipe 福建麵

Alright, it's time for another delicious noodle dish on Smoky Wok - today's feature is quite a sinful noodle dish said to have been brought over by Chinese immigrants from the southern province of Fujian a long time ago to Malaysia.  Hokkien noodles has since turned into almost a Chinese Malaysian culinary icon, almost all Malaysian styled restaurants serve this savoury and addictive noodle dish.  Why do I call this sinful? Well, because a true Hokkien noodle dish contains pork fat or 'chu you cha', essentially pork fat rendered in hot oil and fried to crispy deliciousness - rather artery clogging so this is definitely not a dish you want to eat too often :O. This dish also depends a lot on the increasingly less elusive wok breath or 'wok hei' where the slight smokiness gives this dish its' deeply pleasing flavours.

It is not that difficult to re-create at home although I have to admit that industrial sized woks and stoves really give much better wok breath but nevertheless remains a satisfactory substitute.  For today, I used some shrimp, squid, pork and choy sum as the accompaniments and you can of course switch this around to suit your fancy or availability of ingredients.  I used both thick egg noodles and rice noodles as I prefer to have a mixture of textures but the classic version usually calls for only the thick egg noodles.  I like to serve this dish with Chinese tea as the tea does a good job of cutting into the oiliness a little bit.

Serves 2

Ingredients:

200g fresh thick egg noodles (soak in hot water for about 15 minutes and drained) - you can substitute with dry noodles but cook according to package instructions

100g rice noodles (soaked in warm water for half hour and drained)

4 cloves garlic, minced

100g pork, sliced

1 bunch of choy sum, sliced (or use Chinese cabbage if you like)

1/2 cup of small shrimp

1/2 cup of squid (optional)

(mix in a bowl)
4 tablespoons dark soy sauce

1 tablespoon light soy sauce or to taste

1 teaspoon sugar

1 teaspoon white pepper

1 teaspoon corn starch dissolved in 1 tablespoon water

2 tablespoons fried pork fatty bits and more for garnish if desired

Serve with some red chili peppers in soy sauce if desired.

Method:

Firstly, heat your wok until almost smoking.  Add about 3 tablespoons of oil and swirl to coat.  Turn heat to low.  Add garlic and fry until aromatic.  Add noodles and stir fry for about 30 seconds.  Remove noodles.  Wash the wok briskly.

Heat up wok until almost smoking again.  Add 2 tablespoons of oil.  Add in the pork slices and fry cooked.  Remove from wok and set aside.  Heat wok again and add 2 tablespoons of oil.  Add in the shrimp and squid.  Fry for about 30 seconds.  Remove from wok and set aside.

Clean your wok.  Heat wok until almost smoking again.  Add 3 tablespoons of oil.  Swirl to coat.  Turn heat to medium.  Add in the pork fatty bits.  Add in the noodles, pork, shrimp and squid from earlier.  Add in the blanched choy sum.  Pour in the seasoning.  Use a pair of chopsticks or tongs to fry everything together until well incorporated.  Do a taste test and add a bit more light soy sauce if desired or salt.  Add in the corn starch mixture.  Gently stir again with your chopsticks.  Turn heat to high and give the noodles a final stir before turning off the heat.  Serve hot with more pork fatty bits as garnish if you wish.

* To make the fatty pork bits, I used pork belly.  Cube the pork belly and shallow fry in hot oil.  Note that this may be a messy affair but these fatty bits are almost vital to this dish.

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