One of My Favorite Noodles – Yee Fu Mein

This is one of my perennial favorites when it comes to noodles. Hong Kong Yee Fu Mein. This noodle can probably be easily counted as one of the least healthy of Chinese noodles, and yet also probably one of the yummiest.

Yee fu mein (or yee mein for short) is a uniquely Hong Kong-style noodle. In essence, it is a thin wheat noodle that is deep fried during the manufacturing process. And it is sold cooked and shaped into hard crunchy “disks” like this…

I recently discovered this Singapore-made brand and found it to be pretty good – very authentic. One of the closest to the genuine Hong Kong version that I’ve seen. There are many brands of yee fu noodles on the market, and many of them are somewhat localized in style, appearance and texture – what I have dubbed “Singapore-style Yee Fu Mein”.

It is the deep frying step during the noodle-making process that gives yee fu mein its uniquely tasty flavor and texture. But this is also what gives it easily seven to ten times the amount of fat of regular noodles, be they la mian, egg noodles, wheat noodles or rice noodles! And yet, the scrumptious factor of yee mein is such that I would say it is all worth the indulgence, never mind the waistline.

Generally, the noodles are good to go almost straight out of the packet. They just need to be added into a rich stock or gravy, left to simmer and soften for about five minutes, and they are ready to be served.

However, when I cook the noodles at home, I first blanch them in a pot of boiling water for about 2-3 minutes or so, then drain well, before adding them to the gravy to simmer for another 2-3 minutes.

At least in this way, some of the surface oil from the deep frying manufacturing process is removed. It assuages my guilty conscience a little when I see that film of oil left behind in the blanching liquid.

(The noodles are not, in “real life”, such a deep yellow color as seen in the above picture. The camera picked up the yellow tones of the cooker hob’s downlight and turned everything yellow in the photo.)

Right, so what do you cook these noodles with? A key ingredient that almost never varies is superior stock or broth. This forms the basis of any good yee fu mein dish. Other than that, most restaurants sauté the noodles very simply, with just one or two other ingredients.

The most common accompaniment is “yellow or pale” garlic chives, known as “gau wong” in Cantonese and “jiu huang” in Mandarin. These are regular Chinese garlic chives that have been grown under cover, away from sunlight, and thus do not become green, but are instead a very pale greenish-yellow color. Gau wong is more highly prized than the regular green chives (gau choy or jiu cai or koo chye).

Another popular version is dried scallops (gan bei or conpoy or kampoi) yee fu mein. Also a classic preparation is yee fu noodles sautéed with what are known as golden mushrooms (jin zhen gu in Mandarin) to the Chinese and enoki mushrooms to the Japanese. Other than these, the noodles are also occasionally sautéed with crab meat or chicken.

The accompanying ingredients used in cooking yee mein can, fairly flexibly, within some fairly wide boundaries, be improvised and adapted to suit personal tastes. However, stronger tasting meats like beef or lamb, and other intensely flavored ingredients, are almost never used. The yee mein is already richly flavorful in of itself, unlike regular noodles which are bland and pick up all their flavors from surrounding ingredients. As such the supporting ingredients in a yee mein dish are generally kept as simple as possible.

Having said that, this particular version that I cooked recently was a rather mixed bag. I had originally intended to make a vegetarian version of the noodles, using just a mix of different mushrooms, but then decided to add some chicken. And when I realized that I had some char siew (BBQ pork) leftover from lunch, I decided to use that too, to top the noodles with. The final dish was perhaps thus not quite authentically yee mein in that sense. It was a home-style version, but still nevertheless a very delicious variation that was chock-full of ingredients.

The gravy was a combination of carrots, Chinese dried mushrooms and chicken…

The Gravy
• Julienne the carrots and thinly slice the mushrooms.

• Heat a small amount of oil in a wok or frying pan, and add the carrots. Sauté until the carrots are just about to soften. Add some minced garlic and finely chopped shallots. Briefly sauté until the shallots are soft, before adding the mushrooms. Season with some light soy sauce and pepper. Remove from the pan, and set aside.

• Re-using the same pan, again sauté some minced garlic and finely chopped shallots. Once these have softened, add the marinated chicken*. Stir-fry until the meat is cooked through.

* Cut chicken into thin strips and season with a little sesame oil, light soy sauce, oyster sauce, pepper and cornflour.

• Return the carrot/mushroom mixture to the pan, and mix with the chicken. Add about 1 ½ cups (for a 4 person serving of noodles) of superior chicken stock or broth.

(Again, yellow tones of the picture are due to camera effects.)

• Bring gravy to a boil and add the blanched and drained noodles. Allow to simmer for 2-3 minutes. The noodles will absorb most of the broth to give a final dish that has a very slight gravy to it. Taste and adjust seasonings accordingly – adding a little more light soy sauce, oyster sauce and pepper if necessary.

• Finally, if desired, sprinkle some chopped coriander and spring onions (scallions) over noodles. Turn off the heat, and toss noodles to allow the coriander and spring onions to wilt in the residual heat.

Char siew is most definitely an unconventional accompaniment to yee fu noodles. It’s not usually done – except of course in Renee’s kitchen!

No, I wasn’t trying to be creative or to push the boundaries of Chinese culinary culture. I had happened to have some char siew slices left over from lunch, and it seemed such a shame to let them go to waste. So, I simply decided to “refresh” them a little, and add them to the noodles.

The char siew slices were very quickly heated through in a frying pan, with some chopped scallions and a tiny bit (maybe about ½ tablespoon) of oyster sauce added to “enhance” the flavors a little. Just a quick sauté of less than a minute, and the BBQ pork slices were ready to be arranged on top of the plated noodles.

Unconventional it may have been, but still a rather tasty concoction, if I may say so.

Yee fu mein… a rich and intensely flavorful noodle experience.

Copyright © 2004 Renee Kho. All Rights Reserved.
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