CNY mushrooms and noodles (chap chye)

And now some food!

The theme for yesterday's potluck was 'new,' to go with Miss T's newly renovated house. There was lots of awesome food, including delicious sausage rolls, rice paper rolls, a savoury watermelon salad, an array of dips, and other delicious savoury goodies. There was a whole table of sweet goodies as well, my personal favourite was the homemade chocolate icecream, but there was also gingerbread, chocolate balls, lots of cookies, and a fantastic apple risotto thing. It was fantastic! I'm so enthused by our first proper vegan potluck experience that I totally want to hold one soon at House of Penguin!

I was concerned that if I took the 'new' theme to mean new dish, or new ingredient, there might be some sort of unexpected culinary failure and then we'd have to turn up with no dish to share and I'd be all embarrassed, so we went an alternative route and took the new theme as '新年,' or Chinese New Year.

I can't remember what this dish is actually called, so perhaps my sister will read this and remind me - it's something my mum cooks for CNY, and it's delicious. It's also a bit modified - it should have three types of mushrooms, but I only had two, so I went with what I had. ETA: hooray for J! It's chap chye.



CNY mushrooms and noodles

The secret to this is not to soak the noodles for too long - I always do and it messes with the consistency of the dish, but it's still delicious!

ingredients
1 pack bean/cellophane noodles
lots of dried chinese mushrooms
lots of dried black fungus
small piece of fresh ginger, minced or chopped small
one clove of garlic, minced or chopped small
half a cup of stock
half a teaspoon of chilli flakes
1 tbl of dark soy sauce
pepper

method
Soak the mushrooms in hot water for at least an hour, preferably two. Top up with more hot water if they expand so much they're no longer covered.

Soak the bean noodles until soft, then drain.

In a hot wok, heat a teaspoon of peanut oil. Throw in the ginger and garlic, toss through, then drain the mushrooms and throw them in. Toss a few times, then pour in the stock and the chilli flakes. Toss through, then cover and leave to sit for about five minutes. Lift the lid and add the noodles, as well as the soy sauce. Mix through, so that the noodles are all consistently coloured. Put the lid on and leave to simmer until it has soaked up the rest of the stock and sauce - this is a dry dish, it shouldn't drip at all whilst serving.

It's for longevity, you know.