A few years ago, I went on holiday to Thailand with my sister and mother. It remains one of my favourite holidays and when we came home my brother asked about my favourite part. I told him about all the brilliant food, the wonderful street food stalls and the restaurants that appeared at night. Ever since then I have tried to recreate some of the flavours we had then and this, this is the closest I’ve come in a long time.
There are a number of stories of how drunken noodles got their name. Some claim it’s because they’re meant to be so hot they’ll make you feel drunk, others because they’re the perfect hangover food, and there’s another story that their creator made this dish up when drunk. All I know is that this dish is one of my favourites even if it is miles hotter than I can normally bear. Kenny always finds it hilarious when we have this for dinner as he dusts on a few more chillies but I’m there struggling with the heat and downing my almond milk.
I know this is a little bit of an unusual recipe for me, both because of the heat of the dish and because of the use of Tofu. The vast majority of my recipes are soy free and with the lack of clarity on the effect of soy on endometriosis I tend towards minimising my intake. These days I tend to allow myself rare treat days, however if you’d rather not use Soy in your dish I’ve included a few substitute suggestions in the notes below.
If I can give you any tips when cooking this, it would be these;
- You’ll be stir frying this dish and it’s quick so make sure everything is prepped before you start.
- Make sure your kitchen is well ventilated – stir frying this much chilli at once can make the air a little hard to breathe!
- If you can, use a proper, full sized wok as stir frying enough for four people needs both plenty of room and lots of heat.
Try it, I hope you love it as much as I do!
- Makes: Serves 4-6
Ingredients
For the Sauce:
- 14g Dried Shiitake Mushrooms (soaked)
- 7g Ginger
- Oil for frying
- 130ml Soy Sauce Substitute (see Allergy note below)
- 140ml Mushroom Soaking Water
- 2 1/2 Tbsp Kecap Manis
- 2 tsp Vegan Fish Sauce
For the Stir Fry:
- 400g Rice Noodles (as wide as you can find)
- 400g Tofu*
- 3 Tbsp Cornflour
- 4 tbsp Oil
- 1 Large Red Onion
- 6 cloves of Garlic
- 1 tsp Ginger
- 4 Thai Chillies**
- 2 Carrots
- 200g Tenderstem Broccoli
- 200g Asparagus
- 125g Baby Corn
- 1 Red Pepper
- 2 heads of Pak Choi
- 5 Spring Onions
- 40g Thai Basil***
- 1 Lime (optional)
Directions
Starting with your sauce, ideally the dried mushrooms want to be soaked over night but if you don’t have time, try to soak them for at least a few hours until they’re really soft and pliable. Don’t throw away your soaking liquid as that’s going into the sauce too since it holds so much flavour.
When the mushrooms are ready, shred both the mushrooms and ginger. Heat your wok on a high heat with just a touch of oil and stir fry both the mushrooms and ginger till they just start to brown. Add about half a tbsp of your soy sauce substitute and continue to cook, stirring constantly, until the edges are browned and slightly crisp but do not let the ginger burn.
You can now add all your sauce ingredients to a blender, including your mushroom and ginger mix. Blend on a high speed until completely smooth and set to one side.
As mentioned above, you’re going to be stir frying on a very high heat with no time to stop and do the odd bit of prep so it’s important that everything is ready before you start cooking.
I normally start with the rice noodles, prepare them according to the instructions on the pack as different brands have different instructions. Most wide rice noodles need soaking for a little bit of time so start here and make sure you’ve given them enough time before straining so they’re ready when you need them.
We’re going to be prepping your veg in batches here so you have plates that go into the pan at the same time. Cut your onion into thin strips and place to one side. Mince your garlic, finely dice your ginger, and very finely dice your chillies – place these together to one side as they’ll go in the pan together. Next you want to prepare the broccoli, pepper, asparagus, and baby corn. Try to cut all of these into bite size, thin strips – about the length of your thumb as a rough guide. This pile can now be set aside together. Shred your Pak Choi and set aside, followed by cutting your spring onions into batons, again about the length of your thumb. Very roughly shred your basil and finally dice your tofu into 2cm cubes. Coat your tofu with the cornflour and we should now be ready to get cooking.
Put about half your oil into your wok on a medium to high heat. Fry off your tofu in batches, until it’s deep golden brown on all sides and crispy. Don’t crowd the pan as it’ll lower the heat too much and really, don’t touch your tofu until you really have to turn it – fiddling too much will lengthen the cooking time and can make it fall apart. Put your browned tofu to one side.
Add the rest of your oil to the pan and crank up the heat as high as your stove will go – once you start adding ingredients from here on don’t stop stirring, otherwise half your food will burn and the other half won’t cook. When the oil starts to simmer start by adding your onion. When your onion has started to soften and take on some colour, add your pile of ginger, garlic and chilli. Keep stirring but at this point you want to lean back a bit so you don’t breathe in the chilli. After the last addition has begun to soften (it’ll likely take no more than 30 seconds) add your next batch of veg, the broccoli, pepper, corn, and asparagus. Keep stirring and cook until your broccoli turns a bright green and the rest of your veg has started to soften. Now add your pak choi and cook until it just starts to wilt and now you can add your tofu, the spring onions, noodles, and your sauce to the pan. At this point your pan might be getting a little full but keep stirring – you’re almost done! Once the sauce has been fully mixed through, the rice noodles are fully combined with the veg, and all your veg are cooked, add your basil. When the basil is just wilted (seriously this will take seconds) you’re ready to serve!
Serve with wedges of the lime and little bowls of extra chilli for anyone who needs it.
Notes
* If you are trying to avoid soy completely then you can use Burmese tofu (which is chickpea based) or just skip the tofu entirely. You can up the veg content slightly if you feel its needed when skipping the Tofu but I generally don’t.
** Thai, or birds eye chillies are very hot, if you’re struggling to find them (as I have during this lock down) then I’ve had success in replacing them with 4 to 5 larger standard red chillies finely sliced – you’ll end up with a higher quantity of sliced chillies than you would have with the original but it should almost match the heat needed.
***Thai Basil can be a little hard to find so if you need to, it’s absolutely fine to sub in regular Italian basil. In Thailand this dish is normally made with Thai holy basil but that’s practically impossible to find outside Thailand so I would normally use regular Thai basil but if you get lucky and manage to find some, use it!
Allergy Notes; I’m going to keep saying this – Soy Sauce is NOT gluten free as the brewing process contains wheat. A good gluten free option is Tamari which normally contains little to no gluten, is slightly less salty, and thicker than soy sauce. As always, check your brand to make sure you’ve not accidentally picked up one of the few brands which uses gluten. We use coconut aminos in our house, while not quite as rich as soy sauce, it’s both gluten free and soy free but different brands vary tremendously – you may have to look around before finding one that suits you.
If you need to avoid all soy products then double check your fish sauce as most vegan versions contain soybeans – if you can’t get one without then skip it from the sauce entirely.
Apart from this, double check that you’ve picked up proper rice noodles – they should be essentially just rice and water. If you’ve followed my recipe this should be vegan, easily gluten free, nut free and with soy free options too!
