What you need for Crunchy Chow Mein
Here’s what you need for Crunchy Chow Mein. I’ve separated the photos into two components:
- base ingredients: noodles that are crispy and sauce; and
- Vegetable options for topping – there’s really no rules here. Simply use four to five cups of your favorite vegetables.
Because egg noodles are wetter and stickier than Hokkien noodles and don’t crisp up as well, they won’t work as well in this recipe for Chinese Crispy Noodles.
The reason chow mein noodles can turn crispy in a pan is because they have a distinct dryness and slightly crunchy texture (see below).
Use instant noodles or ramen noodles (see this recipe for photos), and you should be good to go! Apply oil to the uncooked noodles and bake them! (Yes, it really does work perfectly, 90% of the time)
How to make Chinese Crispy Noodles
Deep-fried noodles are commonly served at Chinese restaurants, which are crunchy.
Sure, it’s tasty, but my skinny jeans don’t really like it. .
Thus, I pan-fry my Chinese Crispy Noodles when I make them at home. The meaning of this is that the middle part of the noodles doesn’t go as crispy as it would when deep-fried.
However, as long as you make the noodles relatively thin, the entire surface area of the “pancake” does become crispy, so you won’t feel like you’ve been cheated out of crispiness!
The most important part – crunch retention!!
The idea behind this recipe is to use a lot of sauce to soak and soften the noodles, making them similar to regular noodles that can be picked up with chopsticks.
However, it’s crucial to make sure you keep some crunch! To keep the edges crunchy, I like to pour the saucy topping in the center of the crunchy noodle cake.
You will look pretty messy while eating these Crispy Noodles, that’s the only warning I have. The incredibly crispy noodles are sticking out everywhere.
As a result, when you try to stuff noodles into your mouth, some of those crunchy bits will inevitably escape and get on your face in sauce.
That’s all part of the culinary adventure!
