It’s important to rinse rice vermicelli thoroughly in cold water after cooking to keep them from getting sticky. You can let them sit after rinsing, but rinse them again right before adding them to the pan. Rice noodles are so nasty when the noodles all stick together and get all gummy! We’ve experimented with those pre-cooked packages of noodles you add directly to the pan and haven’t been impressed – they take a long time to separate, so they don’t save you much time, and they never get that nice slippery noodle texture. In this recipe I briefly boil the green beans in the rice noodle water before draining and rinsing them together with the noodles – this cooks the beans just a little bit, and keeps them crisp and bright green.
Ingredients
- 5-6 mushrooms, thickly sliced or quartered
- 2 shallots, chopped
- 1 garlic clove, diced
- 1 thumb of ginger, diced
- 1 chilli, diced
- mirin
- fried tofu (I cheat with a package of frozen, pre-fried tofu from Matthew’s foods)
- 1 red pepper, chopped
- soy sauce
- Handful of green beans, ends removed, cut into thirds
- Rice vermicelli. In the packages they are usually pressed into cuboids, and I usually use 3 of these for the 2 of us.
Directions
- Put water on to boil for the noodles.
- Saute the shallots and mushrooms in veggie oil for 5-6 minutes.
- Add the garlic, ginger, chilli and a splash of mirin and soy sauce and cook for another minute or two
- Stir in the tofu and peppers and cook for another couple of minutes.
- When the water is boils, add the noodles and cook for 2-3 minutes. Then add the green beans, continue to cook for another minute. Drain and immediately rinse well in cold water.
- Add the noodles and beans to the pan with more soy sauce (to taste). Garnish with chopped cilantro.