My kids adore Chinese food. Whenever we go to a multi-cuisine restaurant, most of the times they order these vegetable noodles. And not just the kids, the adults love it as well. Its astounding to see this Indo Chinese dish take various forms to have evolved as a famous street food as well. In my opinion, to taste good, the noodles need have to be bathed in oil and made to look so greasy like in restaurants which is a big turn off for me always. As this recipe is basically a stir fry of vegetables along with noodles, I prefer the vegetables crisp and hate it when the noodles are over cooked and appear mushy. Unlike the hakka noodles, this one is very simple and quick to make and will make a very good lunch box recipe for the kids as you can add lots of vegetables.
My younger one absolutely refuses to eat cabbage and so I add lots of them while making this noodles for him and the lunch box comes back empty always. Apart from the usual vegetables you can add baby corn if they like and also mung bean sprouts to make it even more healthy.
Chinese Vegetable Noodles Recipe
Prep time: 10 mins | Cook time: 15 mins | Serves: 2
Cuisine: Indo Chinese | Category: Main
Cuisine: Indo Chinese | Category: Main
Ingredients:
- Noodles – 1 packet
- Carrot – 1
- Capsicum (bell pepper) – 1
- Cabbage, shredded – 1/4 cup
- Spring onions – 2
- Onion – 1
- Garlic – 3 pods
- Green chilies – 2
- Soy sauce – 2 tsp
- Green chili sauce – 1 tbsp
- White Vinegar – 1/2 tsp
- Aji-No-Moto (Chinese salt) – 2 pinch (optional)
- Black pepper powder – 1/4 tsp
- Salt – to taste
- Oil – 2 tbsp
Instructions:
- Heat 3 to 4 cups water in a wide saucepan. Add 1/2 tsp oil and 2 pinch salt to the boiling water. Now break the noodles block into 2 and add it to the boiling water.
- Keep stirring and pay attention as they water will boil and spill over. Let the noodles cook for 5 to 7 minutes or al-dente.
- Dump the entire contents of the pan into a colander and either pour cold water all over the cooked noodles or place the colander under running tap water. This will prevent the noodles from becoming mushy and sticky and will keep it separate. Keep aside and let all the water drain completely.
- Slice the onion thinly. Slice both the white and green parts of the spring onion and keep them separate. Shred both the carrots and capsicum very finely. Chop the garlic finely and keep aside. Slit the green chili in the middle.
- Heat a wok or frying pan with oil. We are going to cook the entire dish over high flame. First add the garlic and cook for 1/2 minute. Add the sliced onion and the white part of the spring onion and toss around for 1 minute.
- Now add slit green chili, shredded carrots, cabbage, capsicum, green part of the spring onions, Aji-No-Moto and toss for 1-1/2 to 2 minutes. Keep 2 tsp of green spring onions aside for garnish.
- Now add the green chili sauce, soy sauce, white vinegar, salt and toss for 1/2 minute.
- Add the noodles and with the help of a fork separate them if they are lumpy. Toss well till it gets heated and mixed well with the vegetables and sauces.
- Finally sprinkle pepper powder and toss once again. Garnish with green spring onions.
- Serve hot with tomato sauce.
Notes:
- The Noodles should not be over cooked. Always add it to boiling water.
- Instead of green chili sauce you can also use red chili sauce.
- As we are adding green chili, chili sauce, black pepper powder, adjust the ingredients according to your spice level.
- The sauces will also have salt in them, so while adding salt, add less than necessary. You can always adjust it in the end.
- Cook the entire dish over high flame. The vegetables should be crisp and have a bite to them and not soggy and soft. Keep all the ingredients nearby and add one after the other quickly.
- Do not add soy sauce more than mentioned as it will darken the noodles.
- I used vegetable noodles packet, but you can also use egg noodle packet and follow this recipe.
