I thought it would be fun to learn how to make noodles from scratch. I’ve seen a lot of videos of hand pulled noodles and the process of making it seemed simple.
IT IS….IT’S SO EASY, stretching the noodles is the trickiest part, but the rest of the process is not hard at all.
So let’s make some hand pulled chilli noodles!
Video Tutorial
Breakdown of the process
Even though making these noodles it easy, there are a few different steps. So here’s a quick overview of what you are going to need to do:
- Make your dough – you only need 3 ingredients for this, plain flour, salt and water.
- Knead the dough – you want to knead this for about 5 minutes, just until the dough is smooth.
- Divide the dough into pieces.
- Coat your pieces into oil and leave to rest for an hour – it’s important not to skip this resting time. The dough will be too tough to stretch out at first.
- Start pulling your noodles, into noodles shapes – I will talk more about how to do this in the next section.
- Cook the noodles – these noodles cook very quickly, they only take around a minute.
- Make the chilli oil and coat the noodles in this – after this, they’re done.
Making the noodle shapes
So like I mentioned, stretching the dough into noodle shapes is a little tricky.
All you are doing is pulling them, that’s not the hard part. But getting them all to be even sizes and thicknesses takes some practice. Mine we’re not all the same thickness at all.
But with that being said, I think the point of hand pulled noodles is for them to not be perfect. So I guess it doesn’t really matter.
Here’s how to stretch the noodles:
- Get one of your dough pieces, after it has rested.
- Start stretching this from both sides, with your hands. As you are doing this, keep hitting the dough down on your counter.
- Once it has become longer, fold it over, then carry on stretching and hitting it down.
- Once you separate this, you will have 1 big noodle. It’s up to you if you want to cut this in half or keep it the way it is. I kept it the way it is.
- Just repeat this with the rest of the dough pieces.
I wanted to mention, stretch your dough out as much as you want. I like when noodles are on the thinner side, so I stretched them out to be thin.
But if you like thicker noodles, just stretch the dough pieces out less.
Also side note, your noodles will have a thick rounder edge on both sides. This is where you were holding the dough. I cut these edges off, you don’t have too, but I did!
A few tips
If the dough is not stretching, leave it to rest for longer
If you’re finding it hard to stretch the dough, or if it keep breaking as you stretch it, it just needs longer to to rest.
Place it back into your oil, and leave aside for about 20-30 more minutes.
Don’t place your noodles on top of each other
This might be obvious, but I didn’t realise.
Once you have stretched the dough pieces, don’t place the raw pieces on top of each other or too close together.
The will stick together, then you will have one giant lump of dough.
So keep the noodles separate.
Cook the noodles in batches
You don’t want to throw all your noodles into your boiling water at once. This will also cause them to stick together.
When cooking dried noodle, we don’t need to worry about this because they’re dry, they’re not going to stick.
But fresh noodles can be sticky, so cook them in a few batches.
The chilli oil
The last step it to make the chilli oil and coat the noodles in this.
I wanted to make a quick easy sauce for this, so this is why I made a chilli oil. But you can coat your noodles in whatever you want.
Even if you are making a chilli oil, make it the way to want. I used added garlic, red chillies, chilli flakes, a spring onion, brown sugar and soy sauce. But customise this to your taste!
Here are a few other recipes I think you might like:
Hand Pulled
Chilli Oil Noodles
Ingredients
- For the noodles:
300g plain flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
180ml water
Plus some vegetable oil
- For the chilli oil:
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 red chillies, chopped
2 teaspoons chilli flakes
1 spring onion, chopped
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon soy sauce
3 tablespoon vegetable oil
- Extras:
Some store bought chilli crisp (optional)
Some sesame seeds to sprinkle on top (also optional)
Directions
- Making the noodles:
- In a large bowl, add the flour, salt and water. Mix this until a dough forms, then knead until you get a smooth ball, this will take around 5 minutes. You can either do this using a stand mixer, or just place the dough on your counter and knead by hand.
- Cut this dough into about 12 pieces. Form these pieces into rough rectangles.
- Pour some vegetable oil into a plate or bowl, then add add your dough pieces into this. Coat these pieces in this oil, then cover and leave aside for 1 hour.
- After an hour, fill a pot with water and let this come to a boil.
- Get one of your dough pieces and start stretching this out, whiles hitting the dough on your counter as you do this. Once it starts to get a little longer, fold this over and stretch again. Once you separate this, you should have one long noodle. It is up to you how much you want to stretch your noodles, if you like thin noodles, stretch them more, if you like thick noodles, stretch them less.
- Do this with a few more of your dough pieces, then place them into your boiling water. It's best to cook them in batches so that they don't stick together. Cook them for about 1-1.5 minutes, or just until they start to float.
- Keep repeating this until you have stretched all of your dough and cooked all of it.
- Making the chilli oil:
- In a bowl, add all the ingredients, except the oil.
- Add your oil into a pot and heat this just until it is hot. Pour this into the bowl and mix everything together.
- Mixed this with your cooked noodles, add some chilli crisp and sesame seeds if you want and then enjoy!
