Stir-fried Starch Jelly Noodles

Mung bean starch is a strange beast. I found it, at a whopping £3.99 at the Korean supermarket below Centrepoint, after reading Sunflower's post on making Sichuan liang fen (starch jelly) noodles. I had to have it; in her post, she says if you like rice noodles, you'll like these - I LOVE rice noodles. My first batch failed, after I mixed the boiling water all in one with the starch in cold water; I got major clumps. But then I tried again, mixing in the water bit by bit and mixing until smooth and it was a success.

The result is this weird, liquid-solid state. Poke it gently with your finger and your finger comes away clean, the surface feeling hard. Place your spoon into it and it cuts through like liquid; I was quite amused. EDIT: I've since been told by Su-Lin that this is, in fact, a non-Newtonian fluid. So for some brain boggling, have a read about it here.

The mixture is then placed in an oiled container to set in the fridge, and you can then slice it into noodles. At first, it was dressed with spring onion, garlic, tahini, chilli and coriander (top picture). Later when I came home from work and craved something hot and spicy, this was born.

Vegetables were stir-fried with a bit of pork, and the the starch jelly noodles, having sat in boiling water for a bit, were drained and added. They became translucent and fried well, holding their shape. I much preferred them to the cold noodle salad I had and I wonder how they'd hold up in a noodle soup.

Stir-Fried Starch Jelly Noodles

Serves 2

For the noodles:

100gr mung bean starch
500gr water
A pinch of salt

Mix the starch well with half of the water. Add the salt. Bring the other half up to the boil and add bit by bit, mixing the solution until well combined. Grease a tupperware box and pour into it. When cooled, place in the fridge.

To use, slice thinly width ways and then slice again to the width of the noodle desired.

For the noodle dish:

200gr starch jelly noodles
2 cloves of garlic
1 inch of ginger
1 chilli
1 tbsp Chinese black vinegar
1 tbsp Shaoxing rice wine
1 tbsp light soy
1 courgette, cut into batons
A few Chinese leaves, or cabbage, torn roughly
Some meat - pork or chicken. Prawns would work too
1 egg
2 spring onions, sliced diagonally
A small handful of coriander, chopped roughly

Bring a pot of water to boil and add the noodles into it and take off the heat. Mince the chilli, garlic and ginger. Fry this in a wok for a few seconds, then add the cabbage / chinese leaves, courgette and the meat if using (prawns go in at the end, not this stage). Stir fry for a few minutes, then drain the noodles and add this. Fry on a high heat. Crack the egg in and in stir-frying this should scramble it; take the wok off the heat immediately. Keep stir-frying, add the spring onion and coriander, and serve.