Dan Dan Noodles

Source: Chinese Cooking Demystified

Servings: 4

Ingredients:

• 400g Thin Shengmian (生面) Noodles

Sauce

• ½ tsp of whole Sichuan Peppercorns (花椒)
• 2 tablespoons home made Chili Oil (红油), plus more to serve
• 1 tablespoon Sesame Paste (芝麻酱)
• 3 tablespoons Light Soy Sauce (生抽)We’re gunna mix this in with the following three ingredients over heat – the traditional ratio is 10 parts soy sauce, 5 parts sugar, and one part dark Chinese vinegar. Note that we’re only gunna be using two tablespoons of this mix – I overestimated just in case you get a little too much reduction or wanna up your sauce quantity.
•  1.5 tablespoons Sugar
• 1 tsp Dark Chinese Vinegar (陈醋)
•  ½ tsp MSG (味精)

Pork Topping

• 100g 70/30 Pork Mince (猪肉碎) 
• ¼ tsp Salt
• ½ tsp Sugar
• ½ tsp Cornstarch (生粉)
• ½ tsp Sesame Oil (麻油)
• Liaojiu aka Shaoxing rice wine (料酒), ½ tsp to marinate the pork, ½ tbsp used to flavor the topping while cooking
• Light Soy Sauce (生抽), ½ tsp to marinate the pork, ½ tbsp used to flavor the topping while cooking.
• 3 tbsp Sichuan Yacai (芽菜), taste to check if salty
• 3-4 dried deseeded chilis (去籽干辣椒)

Garnish

• 1 Baby bok choy
• Green Onions (葱) Sliced
• Fried peanuts

Directions:

1. Marinate the pork Combine the pork with the salt, sugar, cornstarch, soy sauce, liaojiu, and sesame oil and marinate for 10-15 minutes
2. Toast and Grind the Sichuan peppercorns. Toast Sichuan peppercorns over low heat for about a minute then grind in a mortar or coffee grinder until fine. 

Sauce: 

1. Heat up the soy sauce, sugar, vinegar, and MSG mixture until the sugar is dissolved and turn off the heat. 
2. Mix two parts of that soy sauce/sugar mixture, two parts chili oil, and one part sesame paste. Sprinkle in the ground Sichuan peppercorn powder, and mix thoroughly.

Yacai and Pork topping 

1. As always, before you stir-fry, longyau. Get the wok piping hot, turn off the heat, add in a bit of oil and swirl it around to get a nice non-stick surface. On low, add in those dried deseeded chilis and fry for 30 seconds, until start to turn color. Take them out and toss em. 
2. Add in the Yacai and continue frying on low heat for about a minute, until they start to slightly wilt. 
3. Up the heat to medium-high (high on a western stove), and toss in the pork together with its marinade. Stir fry for about a minute or so, being sure to break up the pork mince. 
4. Once the pork has changed color, add in that half tbsp of liaojiu cooking wine. When you add it, be sure to put it on the spatula and pour it around the sides of the wok. 
5. Do the same with a half tbsp of soy sauce. Once that liquid’s mixed in well and no longer visible, take it out and the topping is finished.

Noodles

1. Boil the noodles. We’ve got enough noodles, topping, and sauce for four bowls of noodles. Boil the noodles – for Shengmian they should take about three minutes (just follow the directions for any other sort of noodle). Taste them to make sure they’re cooked, then rinse under cool water to stop the cooking process.
2. Assemble the Dan Dan noodles. Scoop three spoonfuls of the sauce and spread over the bottom of a bowl. Place the noodles over the sauce, then nestle the meat filling on top. I should note that our recipe’ll give you a little more meat topping than you’d get at a Chengdu street stall because, hey, why not? Scoop and extra couple spoons of chili oil around the noodles, and garnish with some green onion.

Notes

This was very good, best of the dan dan noodles recipes tried out of serious eats and wok of life. I might have even tried the sichuan chinese food one too. Savory, spicy, with a little hint of vinegar.