Tuesday 26 October 2010

Wagamama Ways with Noodles book.


As regular readers of this blog know, I've been following a pretty restricted diet throughout most of 2010 in the hope of easing my stomach problems - it's worked and it hasn't worked, and it has made me a little bored with the difficulties of eating out and with eating the same things over and over again. However, in the summer, we discovered a new food that I liked, and a new place that we could go out to eat - Noodle bar food! And in particular, Noodle Soup. As long as I choose rice noodles, then it is an absolutely fabulous option - no dairy products in sight and hugely hugely tasty. It's not exactly baking, but I am quite pleased about it, so thought I'd tak about it on the blog.

It wasn't long before I wanted to recreate the noodle bar food at home. I initially made up a recipe, but then a friend recommended the Wagamama Cookbook. I've not actually been to Wagamama - it's more pricey than the Noodle Bar in Oxford, and the menu options actually seem less appealing, but I knew that they were famed for good noodle recipes. I looked in the library, and whilst the Wagamama Cookbook was out on loan, I spotted another book - Wagamama: Ways with noodles. What fantastic inspiration, some lovely ideas of different ways to cook noodles.

One night, stuck for what to cook for dinner, I found a recipe and showed it to K and asked him if he'd like it. He gave his approval and then I broke it to him that I didn't have any of the right ingredients really - we didn't have sea bass, but we did have salmon, we didn't have the veg. listed but we did have a bag of stir fry veg, we didn't have the right sort of noodles, but we had some other ones....*

So here follows my special noodle soup recipe, inspired by the Wagamama Noodle Book.

* Cook enough noodles for however many people you're feeding, and drain (can be thin rice ones, fat rice ones, any sort really - I used thin white ones).
* Grate some fresh ginger into a saucepan, add a good shake of chilli flakes (or some chopped fresh chilli), add a good shake of soy sauce.
* Add some boiling water and bring this to the boil.
* Throw in some stir fry veg (either cut up your own or use a ready mix)
* Put in a piece of salmon, per person (or you could use prawns) and simmer with the veg until cooked through.
* Remove the salmon onto a plate
* Put the cooked noodles in with the vegetables to reheat.
* Plate up the noodles and vegetables and soup (need a nice big bowl really) and serve the fish on top.


I won't be posting tomorrow as I have to attend a funeral, but I have an exciting domestic arts post lined up for Thursday - it's been a while since I did one of those and I'm quite impressed with my latest domestic art.


* This has led to subsequent difficult conversations regarding what to have for dinner these days. I'll ask K what he wants, and he'll say something like - "yes, let's have roast beef, but without the roast beef".

7 comments:

  1. The noodle soup you made looks incredibly authentic!

    Despite loving both noodles and soup I have an aversion to noodle soup... I think it was the smell of chicken noodle soup cooking as a child, which I did find appetising at all.

    Do you still have the Wagamama book? Is the recipe for Amai Udon (teppan-fried udon noodles in a tamarind sauce with prawns, egg, tofu, beansprouts, red onion and leek. Garnished with peanuts and lime) in it? That's the dish I am currently addicted to with a wish to recreate; it is the closest I have found to Pad Thai in a chain noodle bar.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I love both of these books! Love the look of the salmon that you made, looks really appetizing.
    Wagamamas is the only place in Norwich that serves cheapish nice Japanese food and it is really nice. I like the chicken Katsu curry.
    Oohh, can't wait to hear about your craft project.

    ReplyDelete
  3. That sounds delicious! one of my favourite quick-quick-quick dinners is miso soup with stuff in it, it's so adaptable and delicious. This sounds like a great variant :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. love noodles, love this book, and would love you to come over and cook dinner for me;)

    ReplyDelete
  5. I have the Wagomama cookbook and have enjoyed a few recipes from it, but it isn't the most authentic book I've come across. My favourites are Japanese Cooking by Emi Kazuko or The Food of Thailand by Murdoch Books. I do love noodle though and they are so quick to cook :-)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Claire - I was pretty impressed with it :) I never had chicken noodle soup as a child - this is a new experience to me - I will check the recipe book for that recipe - remind me if I forget!

    Jane - I have some miso paste but I have yet to use it for anything other than spreading on toast (a strange alternative to marmite).

    Jackie - I'm not sure if I'd be into authentic food - I'm quite picky, so like a sanitised version!

    Hayley - it's sooooo easy, you don't need me too - even Ken can do himself noodle soup now :p

    ReplyDelete

Do leave a comment - I love to hear from people who read my blog.