Modern Living

KL Hokkien Mee is one of my favorite noodle dishes from Malaysia. The dish is known for its thick noodle, dark soy sauce, seafood, and fried pork lard. The salt and fat combination is high on my list as a must have Asian comfort food. As much as I like this dish, I have not found a restaurant in the Bay Area that makes a respectable KL Hokkien Mee. Taking matters into my own hands, I have been experimenting with this dish for some time.

I like my KL Hokkien Mee dark and flavorful. It must have a little gravy but not too excessive. It’s got to have the secret pork lard but it must not be drenched with oil. I like the seafood and pork meat fresh, plump, and juicy. The meat should not be over cooked nor look like it’s been soaked in soy sauce. The color of the dark soy sauce should stay with the noodles, not the meat.  Most importantly, like most tasty dishes, it’s got to be cooked in the right heat. This is a challenge since we are normally not equipped with 3-5 ring gas burners at home.

There are two key highlights to making homemade KL Hokkien Mee. One,  it’s the fried pork fat that makes this dish tasty. Like my friend DW say, “Hokkien Mee is a sinful delight!”  Second, it’s cooking the noodles under intense heat. The heat keeps the noodle texture and length. At home, we have heating limitations for cooking any stir fried noodle dish. Thanks to my dad, Billy, who taught me how to solve this problem. My dad taught me the technique of marinating noodles before cooking it. This step is key to any successful stir fry noodles made at home. It gives you the control to even out the sauce in the noodles before it gets soft and sticky, causing your noodles to clump up and break easily.

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Ingredients and Preperation:

Noodle and Sauce:
3 packs of Udon noodles
1 TBS Sweet Soy
1 TBS Sesame Oil
Pinch of salt and white pepper
1 TBS Dark Soy, and later add more to get color darkness

Loosen the noodle in a bowl. You might need to microwave the Udon noodles for about 1-2 minutes to loosen the noodles if it is cold. It is easier to separate the noodles when it is warm, not hot or cold. Pour the sauce onto loose raw Udon noodles. Mix the noodles and add more dark soy to get the a darker color in the noodles (optional).

Meat and Seafood:
2 strips of cut bacon
1 cup shrimp (marinate it with pinch of salt and white pepper)
1 cup of sliced pork lion (marinate it with pinch of salt, white pepper, and 1 TBS of corn starch)
1 cup of cut squid (marinate it with pinch of salt and white pepper)

It is important to marinate the pork in a little corn starch. The corn starch softens the meat and makes it more tender and juicy.

Vegetable:
3 cups of any one vegetable of your choice from Yu Choy, Ong Choy, Bok Choy, or Gai Lan (chinese broccoli). The greener the leaf the better. The vegetable’s don’t alter the taste of the noodles.
3 cloves Garlic, chopped

Other Ingredients:
1 TBS Oil (Vegetable, canola, corn, or olive oil)
1/2 TBS Oyster Sauce

Cooking Directions:

1. Add oil and bacon in wok and cook until the bacon is golden brown. You want to get as much pork lard oil as possible. Scoop the crispy bacon and about 1 TBS of bacon oil into a bowl for later use.

2. Stir fry half the chopped garlic and pork until the pork is almost cooked. Add the rest of the seafood ingredients into the wok. Add oyster sauce and some white pepper onto the meat and seafood. When the seafood are about cooked, add the vegetables into the meat and stir fry the dish until everything is cooked but not over cooked. Once this is fully done, pour everything into a plate.

3. Without washing the wok (because it’s got lots of flavor), pour the remaining becon oil into the wok and add the rest of the chopped garlic. When the garlic is turning brown, add in the marinated noodles. Stir fry the noodles and add about 1/2 – 1 cups of water to soften the noodle.

4. When the noodle is soft and steaming hot, add in the cooked meat and seafood. Stir fry all the ingredients together until it’s well mixed. Add some white pepper to taste (optional) and add in the crispy bacon. Stir well and your done!

This dish is best served with Sambal Balacan Chilli sauce. I hope you enjoy this dish as much as I did. If you have any question, email me!