Gluten Free Chow Mein Noodles, Take 2

Whew, VERY busy day! I tried to catch up on my holiday “pre-baking.” I like to make all of my dough ahead of time, freeze them and then just pull them out and cook as needed. Today I got all of the peanut butter centers for my Buckeyes formed and frozen, and made 3 batches of sugar cookie dough (trying new recipes!).  I also made a second attempt at gluten free Fig Newtons, and although they are still ugly, the filling is as close as I have come thus far.  Now I just need to work on the cookie form!

I also tried to finish up my homemade gifts that I like to give the gals in my life. Having DH as well as celiac I am very conscious of the skin care products I use. Last year, when the economy was exceptionally bad (at least it was for our family), I thought it would be fun to learn how to make my own soaps to give as Christmas gifts. I had so much fun, I branched out to body scrubs (the last body scrub I purchased was for $40 and I can make my own for about $1 using stuff out of my pantry!!).

Lastly, I received a box of Choice Batter to taste test and review on my blog, so I worked on that today too. We did the tasting tonight (yum) and I will try and get my review done tomorrow. The reason I mention this now though, other than to entice you to come back and see a great new GF product 😀 , is that before I fried the chicken, I took advantage of the hot oil and tried out chow mein noodles again.

I really cannot tell you how close these are to the real thing because I cannot remember what the chow mein noodles in the can taste like! I can tell you this though…they turned out GREAT!

I stumbled across an article on About.com on How to Make Chow Mein Noodles. Basically, they are parboiled noodles that are pan fried on each side. The recipe in the article calls for egg noodles, but I just used the GF noodles I had on hand. I also deep fried them instead of pan frying them since the oil for the fried chicken was heating up. I tested this recipe using Orgran’s Corn and Rice Spaghetti, Eden Selected 100% Buckwheat Soba Noodles, and Tinkyada Brown Rice (with Rice Bran) Spaghetti.

Gluten Free Chow Mein Noodles

1/2 pound GF Spaghetti

Oil for frying

1 tsp. Sesame Oil

• Cook the noodles according to the directions on the package (I broke my noodles into small pieces before I cooked them). If no directions are available, cook the noodles in 8 cups of boiling water until they are cooked “al dente” – tender, but with a bit of resistance in the middle. Use a wooden spoon, or cooking chopsticks to separate the noodles while they are cooking, (I cooked mine for about half the time each package indicated).

The rest of the directions are simply what I did:

• Remove the noodles with a slotted spoon and place in a colander. Rinse the noodles twice in cold water and drain thoroughly each time.

• Toss the noodles in 1 teaspoon sesame oil.

• In a large pan or dutch oven, heat oil on medium-high heat.

This is the Orgran "Chow Mein." They are good, but took last place because of the corn. The corn made the chow mein taste too much like popcorn.

This is the 100% Buckwheat Soba Noodle. The Soba took second in taste, but first in the color category.

Hands down, the Tinkyada placed first for us. Not sure if they are an exact carbon copy, but that didn't matter, we loved them! I will break the noodles into smaller pieces next time.