Monday (and Friday) I made the Dan Dan Noodles recipe from J. Kenji Lopez-Alt’s The Wok cookbook. Monday was for my family, and then I had enough of the ingredients left over to invite some friends over for Dan Dan Noodles lunch on Friday.

Aside from the Homemade Sesame paste, Fried Peanuts, and Sichuan Málà (Hot and Numbing) Chile Oil, the bulk of ingredients are standard (especially in the context of this cookbook). The ya cai or zha cai has been called for before, but not commonly. I had some ya cai packets left from the last time I hunted for them.

The dish is really an assembly of parts. The sauce is made from the sesame paste, soy sauce, vinegar, chile oil, garlic, and Sichuan peppercorns. It gets mixed up and divided among bowls. The pork is stir fried with the ya cai, Shoaxing wine, and soy sauce. With that prepped, and the various other ingredients ready, the fresh noodles cook for the brief amount of time needed, divided among the sauce-containing bowls, then topped with a bit of cooking liquid, the pork, Sichuan peppercorn, scallions. The directions don’t say when to add the fried peanuts, but I added them at the end with the rest of the topping ingredients.

Megan and I enjoyed it. It was obviously going to be too hot for the kids, so I didn’t even ask them to try it. The chile-oil heat is the dominant flavor, but is tempered by the sesame paste and diluted with all the ingredients. The noodles, peanuts, and pork all contribute a variety of textures.

I’ll make this one again, but I don’t think I’ll put in the effort to home-make all the ingredients again, nor bother to get all of the optional ingredients. It can be a quick meal using what I have on hand.

I am cooking my way through J. Kenji Lopez-Alt’s The Wok cookbook. Read more about it.