Yakisoba with eringii and abura-age

Today, yakisoba, the Japanese version of Chinese fried noodles. Well, that’s my version of it… well, one of them. See others at the end of this post.

Yakisoba is fast-food normally. It’s often sold cheaply on street stalls, at festivals and the teppanyaki (hot plate) shops propose it too. The basic version is made mostly with :

-chuka soba (fresh Chinese noodles that are sold fresh and cooked, they look like thick spaghetti and if you have none, cooked thick spaghetti can be used)
-oil

That’s why we said it’s fried noodles, no mystery. And low amounts of :

-cabbage (cut in big squares)
-additional veggies (cut in thin slices), few and cheap ones (bean sprouts, onion, carrot, some kind of leeks…)
-a little raw meat (thin slices of pork), or cheap seafood, or ham…
-sauce (specific sauce or thickened Worcester sauce or a mix of Worcester + ketchup…), plus additional ketchup or mayo if you want
-pickled ginger, toppings…

My version uses what I have in my fridge, and it’s usually healthier.

So, I had abura age (fried tofu) as meat.

A few Eringi mushrooms as meat too.

I had a leftover of green papaya.

I first toasted the abura-age (fried tofu pockets), set aside. Then with a little garlic and ginger : onion, eringi mushrooms, green papaya, cabbage and shishito green peppers. To the veggies, I’ve added fresh Chinese noodles (chuka soba), sauce (Bulldog).

I’ve added the abura-age to the rest. I have about half of veggies, less than one third of noodles. That’s how I like it.

On top, a little more sauce, shichimi togarashi (7 spice mix) and cut green negi leeks.

Spicing up the Chuka standards, mabo tofu and yakisoba

Chuka, is Chinese cuisine in Japan. These 2 dishes are so boringly classic that you always want to make variations.
Beware : it’s hot today ! On the table too.

Momen tofu, cotton tofu. It’s squeezed in cotton. The mark of the fabric is visible. It’s a firm tofu. I just let it on a plate and excess water goes out (it’s possible to add a second plate + something heavy on top).

That’s a new variation of mabo tofu.
-garlic, onions, Chinese miso, chili pepper. Stir-fried.
-plus tomato paste and cooked kabocha skin. Simmered.
-plus a garam masala mix of Indian spices
-plus the water squeezed tofu

It has a Singapore curry taste. That must be the effect of black beans from miso combined with Indian spices.

home-made eggs noodles

A shahan, fried noodles. Very simple : oil, garlic, lettuce, soy sauce. Toppings are negi and shichimi togarashi (7 spice mix) plus a few drops of fragrant sesame oil.
PLUS ichimi togarashi (=pure hot chili flakes).
OOOOOOOOOCh !
The truth is I’ve confused the pure chili and the mix.

So, I’ve ended with 2 very spicy dishes. And I’ve love them to the point of licking the chopsticks.

Speedy fusion : sara-udon ratatouille

Ready in 4 minutes. Japanese noodles, French veggies, Italian cheese… Pure happiness !

Fried noodles, dry and crispy like crackers. I buy them.

Ratatouille (frozen, made previously in big batch). Grated parmesan cheese.

Sauce on crispy noodles : sara-udon / age-soba

It’s Chinese ramian noodles that have been dried and fried. They are crispy like crackers. They are served with ankake, a thick sauce that contains veggies, seafood and/or meat.
That dish is called sara udon (plate + udon noodle) in Nagasaki and age soba (fried + soba) in Kyoto ? I’m not quite sure, but the 2 names exist for the same dish that is proposed in most izakaya (drinking restaurants).

I buy the fried noodles :

But I prepared the ankake from scratch with veggies (garlic, onion, cabbage, nankin pumpkin, bell pepper, white aubergine, cherry tomatoes, corn starch, oyster sauce and Sichuan pepper).
Pour the ankake on the noodles at the last minutes and eat imediatly before the noddles get wet and lose their crispiness.