How to make Indo-Chinese veg Hakka noodles at home: springy noodles tossed in a smoking wok with shredded vegetables, soy, vinegar, garlic and green chilli.
Hakka noodles are the noodles of Indo-Chinese cooking, India’s own take on Chinese food. The style grew up in Kolkata, where the Hakka Chinese community has lived for generations, and spread across India as a street food and restaurant staple.
Compared with the noodles you might find in a Chinese restaurant in the US, Indo-Chinese noodles are hotter, sharper with vinegar and garlic, and full of crisp, thinly cut vegetables.
The secret is heat, and speed
Street cooks use a huge flame and a seasoned iron wok. At home, use your biggest burner, cook in batches if you double the recipe, and keep everything moving. The faint smoky taste, sometimes called wok hei, comes from noodles touching very hot metal.
Cut thin and even
Shred the cabbage and cut the carrot and peppers into matchsticks roughly the thickness of the noodles. They cook in the same time and wind through the noodles instead of falling to the bottom of the bowl.
Make it your own
- Chilli garlic noodles: double the garlic and add a spoonful of chilli oil.
- Egg or chicken: scramble two eggs or stir-fry thin strips of chicken in the wok first, set aside, and add back with the noodles.
- Schezwan: stir in a tablespoon of Schezwan sauce with the soy.
On our menu you will find veg, egg and chicken noodles, plus Triple Szechuan and shrimp Hakka noodles among the weekend specials.
Recipe
Veg Hakka noodles, Indo-Chinese style
Ingredients
Noodles
- 7 oz (200 g) dried Hakka noodles or thin wheat noodles (check the packet if you need them vegan; some brands contain egg)
- 1 tsp oil
Stir-fry
- 2 tbsp oil
- 4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
- 1 inch ginger, finely chopped
- 2 green chillies, finely chopped
- 3 spring onions, whites and greens separated
- 2 cups finely shredded cabbage
- 1 carrot, in thin matchsticks
- 1 green and 1 red bell pepper, in thin strips
- ½ cup thinly sliced French beans (optional)
Sauce
- 1½ tbsp light soy sauce
- 1 tbsp rice or white vinegar
- 1 tsp red chilli sauce or chilli-garlic sauce
- ½ tsp black pepper
- ½ tsp sugar
- Salt to taste
Method
- Cook the noodles. Boil the noodles in plenty of salted water until just tender, 1 minute less than the packet says. Drain, rinse under cold water, toss with 1 tsp oil and spread out to dry for 10 minutes. Dry noodles fry; wet noodles steam and stick.
- Prepare everything. Cut all the vegetables and mix the sauce before you turn on the heat. The cooking takes under five minutes.
- Fry the aromatics. Heat a wok over the highest heat until it smokes. Add the oil, then the garlic, ginger, chillies and spring onion whites and stir for 20 seconds.
- Toss the vegetables. Add the cabbage, carrot, peppers and beans and toss for 1–2 minutes, so they soften at the edges but stay crunchy.
- Add noodles and sauce. Add the noodles and pour the sauce around the hot sides of the wok. Toss with tongs or two spatulas for 1–2 minutes until every strand is coated and the noodles catch slightly.
- Finish. Taste for salt and vinegar, scatter with spring onion greens and serve straight away, with extra chilli vinegar on the side.
Home-style recipe from the Biryani Pot Indian Bar & Grill Journal. It is not our restaurant's own recipe; for that, visit us.