Lunar New Year Eats - Long, Long Life Noodles

Towards the end of any Chinese banquet -- a wedding, birthday, and most definitely Lunar New Year -- you will get a giant platter of noodles.

You’ll reach for your serving but the noodles won’t stop. They’re long and tangled. You look for a knife, but of course there aren’t any knives at a Chinese banquet table, just chopsticks. Not that your grandma would allow you to cut them. Aiya, do you want to cut your life short?

So you pull and pull and before you know it, your small chopstick pinch turns into an entire plateful.

These noodles aren’t just any noodles, they’re longevity noodles -- uncut and extra long. The long life symbolism and somewhat comical way you eat them got me thinking… what if all the ingredients in Longevity Noodles were long and uncut?

And so I added long beans, flat Chinese chives, enoki mushrooms, and bean sprouts. No stunted peas or diced anything -- we’re looking for length! I gave the veggies a little trim but otherwise kept them at full length.

When it comes to a long life, might as well quintiple down, right?

RECIPE

Note: Stir-fries are easy and very adaptable. All the work is in the prep. Cooking happens in a matter of minutes. The key to stir-frying is to time your ingredients and know how they cook. For example, of all the vegetables in this recipe, only the long beans and Chinese chives sear quickly. The mushrooms and bean sprouts are very watery and will steam before they brown, if they do so at all. So you have to decide what you want to sear and what you want to steam. If you want your ingredients to brown, you may have to cook them in batches so they have room to expel water and brown. Or, you can do as I did and only sear a couple of ingredients, and then add the rest of the watery ingredients to steam all together. This is technically more of a stir-fry/braise, but is equally delicious and a whole lot faster than a true stir-fry.

½ lb longevity noodles (Or any Asian wheat noodle. I like thinner noodles, but they are more prone to breaking which kinda happened here 😬)

1 ½ tbsp oyster sauce
1 ½ tbsp hoisin sauce
3 tbsp soy sauce
½ tsp white pepper
1 tsp sesame oil

1 tbsp grapeseed oil
⅓ lb long beans
½ lb Chinese chives
⅓ lb bean sprouts
⅓ lb enoki mushrooms

Cook noodles according to package instructions. Remove from water when very al dente, since they will continue to cook and absorb water once they’re re-added to the stir-fry. For fresh noodles, this means you could be cooking the noodles for as little as a minute.

Wash, dry, and trim all your vegetables. Mix the oyster sauce, hoisin sauce, soy sauce, white pepper, and sesame oil and set aside.

Heat the wok on high until a drop of water sizzles immediately. Add grapeseed oil. When the oil shimmers, add ginger and stir until fragrant, about 15-30 seconds. Add long beans and stir-fry until the beans start to get some color. Season the beans and other vegetables as you go. Add Chinese chives and continue to stir-fry until they take on color.

Add the mushrooms and bean sprouts. Stir-fry until wilted, about 2-3 minutes. Add the noodles and oyster sauce mixture. Mix gently so you don’t break the noodles.

TIPS & TRICKS

A wok is ideal for stir-fry because its shape is conducive to the browning/steaming method I described above. The ingredients on the bottom sear while the ingredients, piled on top like a bowl, are cooked with steam. (As opposed to a skillet where everything is basically level.) It’s also easier to mix ingredients in a bowl shape. Of course, the classic way of using a wok is to put all ingredients in contact with the wok, ensuring even browning. You control the heat level by moving the ingredients up or down the sides of the wok.

The standard for Chinese chefs is a carbon steel wok, but they can be hard for the beginner or casual cook since they require a somewhat onerous breaking-in process, consistent seasoning (maintaining the oily surface that keeps the wok nonstick-like), and can’t be used with acidic ingredients. That’s why I use the Hestan Nanobond Wok, which combines the best of all worlds. It can be heated to extremely high temperatures like a carbon steel wok (and unlike a non-stick pan), but the titanium coating is non-porous, meaning foods easily release without seasoning or a chemical coating. And unlike cast-iron, the Hestan wok conducts heat quickly, meaning you can cook in a flash. That’s the spirit of stir-fry!

Supermarket Hot & Sour Soup // My Food Network Star Culinary POV

As anyone who watches Food Network Star knows, you can’t just be a good cook and an engaging TV personality. You have to have a CULINARY POV. This might seem simplistic -- I can’t be boxed in! -- but just think about it. Bobby Flay = Southwestern flavors and grilling. Giada De Laurentiis = Italy meets California. Ina Garten = simple but luxurious crowd-pleasers. 

But I’m a home cook and I basically just cook what I feel like. There’s no reason to limit my repertoire in the same way, say, an executive chef has to. Bobby Flay can’t just decide to serve ramen at Bobby’s Burger Palace. 

The casting agency even asks you in the very first application: What is your culinary POV? 

So I had to do some soul searching. Do I cook modern, flashy foods? Or do I go healthy? Or, as my husband suggested, do I make side dishes my POV? 

I’ve watched enough seasons of Food Network Star to know that your best, most authentic culinary POV is never some convoluted, contrived thing. In fact, it’s the cuisine that’s right under your nose. What you grew up with. What you crave. 

I love my "ethnic" supermarkets, my international cookbooks, my food travel shows. My family lives all around the world in Madagascar, China, France, and Norway. It took me a hot sec to realize it, but my culinary POV is: easy international cooking tweaks -- with a focus on Asian cuisine.

When I say “easy”, I mean no special equipment or hard-to-find ingredients. I mean food that can be transformed using a simple spice blend or sauce. I mean demystifying ingredients that’ve been staring you down at the grocery store, daring you to tackle them. 

Which brings me to hot and sour soup. If you’ve had it, it’s very likely you don’t even know what’s in it. Pork and mushrooms, okay. But bamboo shoot, wood ear mushroom, lily flowers? Even I don’t really know what lily flowers look like. Once I *thought* I bought them, but they turned out to be pickled mustard greens. Based on the ingredient list, you might think hot and sour list is out of your reach.

But I’m here to tell you -- it’s not! It’s actually a really easy soup that you can make with items you can find at any grocery store -- not even a fancy one.

RECIPE 

(adapted from Joanne Chang's Food 52 recipe)

1 tsp olive oil
½ lb ground pork (I used 80% lean, but feel free to use whatever.) 
7 scallions, sliced
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 inch knob of ginger, minced
1-1 ½ lb mushrooms, chopped to bite-size (I used a combination of beech, shiitake, and oyster. You can use any combination you like, or even dried.)
32 oz chicken broth
1 tsp sugar
3 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
8 oz firm tofu cut in ¼” slices (I used baked tofu, which is denser than regular tofu, but either works.) 
½ cup unseasoned rice vinegar (if you can't find unseasoned, just skip the sugar in the recipe and proceed as normal) 
1 tsp white pepper
2 endives cut in ¼” slices  

Add oil to a large pot and heat on medium-high until shimmering. Add pork, separate the meat, and cook until some of the fat is rendered out, about 1-2 minutes. Add scallions, garlic, and ginger. Season and cook until aromatic and slightly browned, about 2-3 minutes. Add mushrooms and season again. Cook mushrooms until they have reduced by half, 4-5 minutes. 

Add chicken broth, sugar, soy sauce, and sesame oil. Bring to a boil then simmer for 1 minute. Add tofu, rice vinegar, white pepper, and endives. Simmer for 2 minutes. Serve hot! 

TIPS & TRICKS

• White pepper might be the most esoteric ingredient in this recipe. You can substitute black pepper no problem, but I’d encourage you to add white pepper to your pantry. White pepper is actually the same plant as black pepper, but it’s just processed differently. It has a musky heat that’s characteristic of Chinese dishes, and is an easy Asian twist you can add to any dish that normally calls for black pepper.

• Why endive? Endive isn’t a typical hot and sour soup ingredient -- or an Asian ingredient for that matter -- but it does a great job pinch hitting for bamboo shoot’s bitterness and lily flowers’ crunch.

• I don’t like gloopy soup, so I don’t use cornstarch or any other thickener. Chef’s prerogative!

• Many recipes might call for you to add the mushrooms with the broth. You know this type of mushroom, whether it’s hot and sour or tom yum soup. It’s spongy and floats around. It’s fine! But I want a full-bodied soup so I cook the mushrooms down *before* I add the broth. This concentrates their flavor and makes sure they aren’t water-logged and flabby once the broth is added.

• Adding the vinegar and white pepper at the last minute is key. Cook either of them too long, and you'll lose the hot and sour of hot and sour soup.

Italo-Asian Mushroom Melange

I’m an inefficient shopper -- and I’m okay with that. I’d like to think I shop in the French style, but with a twist. 

When the French shop, they don’t head to the megamart. They get their baguette at the boulangerie, meat at the butcher, cheese at the fromagerie, and produce and fresh flowers at the farmer’s market. 

Talk about #grocerygoals! But I’d venture to say you can do something a little different. Nowadays, I bop around with my groceries, but with ethnic markets. I get my spices, herbs, and rare mangoes from the Indian grocery store. I get much of my produce -- especially fruit, mushrooms, and chilis -- from the Korean grocer. I get my olives and pastry fixes at the Greek grocery, tomatoes and corn from my Jersey Local farmer’s market … you get the idea. 

I love Wegman’s and Whole Foods as much as the next girl, but their “international” sections can be a little underwhelming. Why limit yourself to 1/16 of an aisle when you can have the whole store? 

This Italo-Asian Mushroom Melange is an example of what multicultural shopping can get you. I got these adorable mushroom pasta shapes and Calabrian chilis from an Italian specialty market. I got fresh mushrooms from the Korean grocer. And dried morels from a long-ago French vacation. You might be tempted to make one Italian dish out of all Italian ingredients, but that’d be like wearing head-to-toe of one brand. You can do better! 

Is this an efficient way of grocery shopping? Absolutely not. But it’s a lot more fun and horizon-expanding. 

RECIPE

Serves 4-6 

1 shallot
2 lbs fresh mushrooms -- I used a combination of baby portobello, oyster, white beech and shiitake
1 oz dried morels (optional but a lovely touch) 
¼ cup dry white wine like Sauvignon Blanc or Pinot Grigio 

2 cups pasta -- This is a fun mushroom shape that actually tastes like mushrooms because of dried porcini in the dough
1 ½ tablespoons butter
1 heaping teaspoon crushed Calabrian chili (if you don’t have this, feel free to use red pepper flakes) 
3 tablespoons chopped parsley
Olive oil
Salt

If using, rehydrate morels for at least 10 minutes in lukewarm water. Save the soaking liquid. 

Dice shallot and wash and cut mushrooms. Place two frying pans on the stove on medium heat. Once hot, add olive oil, season shallot with salt then saute until translucent. Add mushrooms to both pans, season, and saute until mushrooms are browned, about 4-5 minutes. Deglaze both pans with white wine. 

Fill large pot with water and liberally salt (it should taste like the sea). Bring to a boil. Cook pasta until slightly underdone, about 6-7 minutes. Do not rinse the pasta because you want some of the starchiness in the final dish.  

Consolidate the mushrooms in one pan. Add the soaked morels, butter, and pasta. Add ¼ cup of the pasta water and ¼ cup of the morel soaking stock (if you didn’t use dried mushrooms, add more pasta water). Stir until butter is melted and the pasta is fully cooked. Add more liquid if the dish seems too dry. 

Right before serving, add parsley and Calabrian chilis. Stir. 

TIPS & TRICKS 

• It might seem fussy to use two frying pans, but you don’t want to overcrowd the mushrooms. Mushrooms contain a lot of water and if they’re packed too tight, the water will steam-cook the mushrooms, rather than brown them.

• It’s okay if your pasta isn’t totally ad dente. A softer pasta will mimic the texture of the mushrooms, making for a more blended bite. The fun of this dish is that the pasta seamlessly meshes with the mushrooms.   

• When you add the butter with the pasta water and mushroom stock, you’re creating an emulsion. An emulsion is two unlike ingredients (like oil and water) that are suspended together. The pasta water is key because the starches create a sort of “scaffolding” where the butter can hang out. Think of roux in a mac and cheese -- the flour stabilizes the cheese. In this case, the starch in the pasta water stabilizes the butter.

Mushroom Thyme Jerky

Oh, beef jerky. You are delicious and nutritious. Sometimes soft, sometimes chewy. Sometimes spicy, sometimes sweet. 

Mushroom jerky? Don't worry about it. It's a different sort of beast... chewy and savory, sure. Meaty, yes. But different. 

Here I roasted and dried four types of mushrooms in a two-step process. There are shiitake, oyster, clam shell, and shimeji. You're basically sucking out the moisture so all you're left with is the mushroom's essence: the earthy, umami-ed soul of the thing. 

What's great about using a variety of mushrooms is that you can get a range of textures. The shiitake get thin and leathery. You'll have to yank at it with your teeth. The oyster mushrooms are still pillowy, but not until your teeth snap through the surface. And the clam shell and shimeji are somewhere in between: chewy on the bottom, tender on top. 

It's not beef jerky, but it's just as good.

RECIPE:

Preheat oven to 35o degrees Fahrenheit. Toss your mushrooms in olive oil, salt and pepper. Sprinkle thyme on top. De-leaf them if you want the thyme to stick. Keep them whole if you want a lighter touch. Roast for 50 minutes then turn off the oven and leave there for two or more hours to dehydrate.

Slow-Cooked Button Mushrooms

Mushrooms used to be a hard sell. It's hard to recall exactly why. Maybe it was their styrofoam pop. Their non-taste. The earthiness. The fact that they're fungi? And then mushrooms got exoticized. In my world, that started with the silky umbrella-like straw mushroom. The meaty portabello. The savory shiitake. As I got older and the food landscaped changed, then came morels, sponges for butter and cream, and maitake, coral reefs of crunch and soft, give and take.

Mushrooms got sexier, and I got more fanatical. One of my favorite dishes is a mushroom melange -- some mix of all of the mushrooms above and perhaps some enoki, trumpet, oyster, lobster, chanterelle.

But I'm a bit disgusted to read that. Snobby, right? The equivalent of a bland designer dress, all label and no style.

This dish goes out to the white button mushroom. I cooked them in the slowcooker to concentrate the mushroom flavor (no sear to distract) and to create mushroom consomme-type thing. Just don't call it normcore.

RECIPE: Wash and trim 2lbs of white button mushrooms. Leave them whole. Add to slow cooker with 2 diced onions or shallots, 3 sprigs of fresh thyme, and a glug of white wine (3 tablespoons-ish). Slow cook on low for 4 hours. Before serving, add a knob of butter and parsley.