Chicken Noodle Salad- Sichuan Style

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This is the most popular Sichuan style cold noodle salad recipe. It is served as a famous traditional Sichuan snack. If you ever visit Sichuan province, you may see there are lots of street vendors selling traditional Sichuan cold noodles, some of them are vegan and this version is with shredded chicken.

In hot summer days, we all love different types of cold Chinese noodle salads including sesame cold noodle, Liang fen noodles, green bean noodles and this yummy shredded chicken cold noodle salad. Back to the school time, in the hot summer days, we ate congee instead of steamed rice. My mom made cold noodles salad as a supplement.

The noodles used in Sichuan province is named as water noodles which is a type of fresh noodles with soda and has slightly yellow color. If you cannot find this type of noodle, you can replace them with fresh noodles. Thinner ones are better. Besides, the traditional recipe calls for rapeseed oil which has a darker color, it is relatively hard to find now.But you can replace it with normal rapeseed oil or sesame oil. 

Ingredients

• 8 oz. fresh thin noodles
• 2 teaspoons rapeseed oil or sesame oil
• 1 small cup of soaked soy beans
• Oil for frying the soy beans
• 1 English cucumber , shredded
• Chopped spring onion for garnish

Cooking the chicken breast

• 1 small chunk of boneless chicken breast
• Around 10 whole Sichuan peppercorn seeds
• 1 green onion
• 2 slices of ginger
• 1 teaspoon salt

Chili oil

• 1 teaspoon Sichuan pepper powder
• 1 tablespoon red chili pepper powder
• 2 star anise
• 4 slices of ginger
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil

Other seasonings

• 3 garlic cloves , smashed
• 2 teaspoons light soy sauce
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1 tablespoon vinegar
• 1 tablespoon sugar

Instructions

1. Pre-soak the dried soy beans until they are double in size. Transfer out and drain with kitchen towel.
2. Peel the tough part of cucumber and then slice into shreds.
3. Add 1 tablespoon cooking oil in wok and add soaked soy beans to fry until you hear the “Pa Pa” sound. Transfer the soy beans out and set aside to cool down.
4. In a large pot, put chicken meat, 2 slices of ginger, whole Sichuan peppercorn s and 1 spring onion in. Bring the content to a boiling and then keep cooking for 5 minutes. Cover the lid and set aside for another 10 minutes until the chicken meat is totally cooked. Soak in cold water and shred with hand.
5. Place Sichuan peppercorn powder, chili pepper powder, 1 star anise, 2 slices of ginger in a small bowl. Heat up around 3 tablespoons of vegetable oil in pan with 2 slices of ginger and 1 star anise until there are waves on the surface and the oil is really hot. Discard the ginger slices and star anise. Pour the hot oil slowly into the bowl with the spicy powders.
6. Cook noodles in boiling water for around 4 minutes. Transfer out. Spread them and cool them down with an electric fan or cold water.
7. Add rapeseed oil in the noodles and mix well. Transfer to a mixing bowl, add chili oil, soy sauce, salt, vinegar, sugar, garlic,shredded chicken meat, chopped spring onion and shredded cucumber. Mix well and then top with chopped spring onion and fried soy beans.
8. Enjoy!

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