Noodles with Peanut and Ginger Sauce and a Carrot Salad

250g/9oz Soba or buckwheat noodles
2Tbsp peanut butter, crunchy or smooth
2Tbsp soy sauce
1Tbsp Mirin*, rice syrup, or honey
1Tbsp fresh ginger, grated
2 Garlic cloves, crushed
1Tbsp sesame oil
for garnish:
a few chilli flakes
a little fresh coriander, chopped

Cook the noodles as per the directions on packet
Mix the peanut butter with the soy sauce, mirin (or rice syrup, or honey), ginger and garlic.
When the noodles are done, drain them and put them back in the pot, swirl in the sesame oil, then add the peanut mixture and toss to coat.

Sprinkle with a few chilli flakes, season and serve scattered with some chopped coriander.

* Mirin is a Japanese sweetener made from fermented sweet rice. I got mine at the grocery store, but you might have to go to a health food store to get it.

This rocks! It’s from a BBC book called Fast, Fresh and Fabulous. When we lived in Brooklyn we used to get sesame noodles from our local Chinese take away. It was one of my all time favorites. This recipe is close enough to make me a bit misty. I love it! My youngest son enjoyed it so much that he got some noodles stuck to his forehead in all the excitement. I used whole wheat spaghetti instead of soba noodles because it’s what I had in the house, and they worked just fine. Next time I make them (probably tonight or tomorrow, that’s how much I like them), I will try using sesame butter and some sesame seeds, just to see if I can get even closer to the original.

I would recommend small portions of this one, as it’s a very heavy sauce. Because of that it goes really nicely with something light and simple like:



Shredded carrots

This is more of a suggestion then a recipe. It’s from the same book, and it’s listed as another thing you could do with some grated carrots. From the list of suggestions, I tried the juice of one orange, and some fresh mint leaves. It was really simple and quite nice. I could see eating it a lot in nicer weather. Some other suggestions included other fresh herbs, various toasted seeds, and other citrus juices.