Easy Shanghai Fried Noodles
I love Shanghai cuisine. Growing up, it’s my go to cuisine whenever my parents asked me what I wanted to eat. Without fail, some of my go to dishes to order at Shanghainese restaurants include Chinese Scallion Pancakes and Shanghai Fried Noodles.
If you’re looking for a quick & easy meal to make, this is it! This easy Shanghai Fried Noodles dish can be made in under 30 minutes and only requires a few simple ingredients.
Ingredients
Shanghai Style Noodles
Shanghai friend noodles are known for their thick noodles. Ideally, you would use these fresh shanghai style noodles that you can find in the refrigerated section of the Chinese grocery store where they keep all the other refrigerated fresh noodles. However, if you’re not able to find this, you can easily substitute this with pre-packaged Udon noodles.
Light and Dark Soy Sauce
You will need both light and dark soy sauce for this recipe. The main reason why Dark Soy Sauce is typically used in Chinese cuisine is to help give the dish their signature dark color. If you don’t add dark soy sauce and just substitute it with regular soy sauce, you will likely get a similar taste but the color of your dish will be much lighter.
There are many brands of Chinese soy sauce out there but my personal favourite is this brand here – Pearl River Bridge. Growing up, my dad was adamant that I only buy this brand (and beware of knockoff brands!).
- Pork chop/loin or protein of choice – traditionally, this dish is made with pork. However, you can easily substitute this with another protein of your choice if you cannot eat pork or you do not have pork readily available.
- Corn Starch – Adding corn starch to meat in the marination process is very common in Chinese cooking. The purpose of this is to not only tenderize the meat but also to create a protective coating around the meat to help with browning which will help seal in the juices and help the sauce to stick to the meat better.
- Oyster Sauce – helps add a savoury flavour to your dish. This is a staple condiment in most Chinese cooking.
- Sesame oil – This is actually optional but I personally love sesame oil and try to add it to all of my Chinese recipes 🙂 It’s quite strong so a little bit goes a long way.
- Chinese Vegetables – This is where you have some flexibility. Feel free to add whatever vegetable you want to this dish whether it be cabbage, mushroom, carrots, or bok choy.
- White Pepper – Unlike most Western recipes that call for ground black pepper, most Chinese cuisine use ground white pepper instead. If you don’t have ground white pepper, you can use ground black pepper.
- Sugar
- Garlic
Dishes to serve with Shanghai Fried Noodles
Shanghai Fried Noodles is a great as a standalone main course but if you are looking for other dishes to sere with this, try some of our other Chinese recipes:
Let us know what you think of this recipe in the comments below!
Easy Shanghai Fried Noodles
Ingredients
- 454g (1 lb) Shanghai Style Noodles*
- 1 tsp minced garlic
- 1-2 cups of chopped green vegetables (e.g. bok choy, chinese cabbage)
Marinade
- 300g pork chops, thinly sliced
- 2 tsp light soy sauce
- 1 tsp corn starch
- 1 tsp sugar
- white pepper to taste
- sesame oil to taste (optional)
Sauce
- 2 tbsp light soy sauce
- 1 tbsp dark soy sauce
- 1 tsp oyster sauce
- 1 tsp sugar
- 3 tbsp water/chicken stock
- sesame oil to taste (optional)
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Instructions
- 1. In a medium sized bowl, add the thinly sliced pork to the marinade (soy sauce, corn starch, sugar, white pepper, sesame oil) and let it marinade for about 30 minutes at room temperature, covered. The longer you marinade it, the better.
- 2. Prepare the sauce by combining all sauce ingredients (soy sauce, dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, sugar, water, sesame oil) in a small bowl and set aside.
- 3. Boil the Shanghai style noodles per package instructions until they are cooked (usually it’s only boiled for a few minutes since they are fresh noodles). Strain and set aside.
- 4. Prepare your wok (or your largest non-stick frying pan) on high heat and add in some vegetable oil to evenly coat the bottom of your pan. When the pan is hot (or starts to smoke), add in your marinated pork and cook until it is no longer pink. It’s best to sear the sliced pork over high heat as this helps retain the juices of the pork. Once cooked, remove and set aside.
- 5. Clean out your pan (you can use a paper towel to wipe off excess oil/leftover pork gunk) and add in more vegetable oil. Again on high heat, add your minced garlic and just as they start to smell aromatic and start turning a dark yellow, add in your chopped Chinese vegetables and cook for about a minute or two. If the vegetables are sticking too much to the pan, add a bit of water to help it cook better.
- 6. Add the cooked pork back into the pan along with the cooked shanghai style noodles. Drizzle the sauce evenly over the noodles and toss everything in the pan to ensure everything is well coated in the sauce.
- 7. Once the noodles are well coated and most of the sauce has cooked off, turn off the heat and serve.
