My First Asian Cooking Experience

Last summer, when I received Blue Apron meals more often than now, I made a chicken ramen dish from Blue Apron called "Chicken Hiyashi Chuka with Fresh Ramen Noodles & Summer Vegetables". It was unbelievably fresh and delicious. I made it while my mom was visiting us in DC and I think we had it for lunch one day. The dish had some boiled/shredded/marinated chicken breast, corn fresh off the cob, pickled cucumbers, fresh sliced tomatoes, arugula, scallions, ramen noodles, and a delicious sweet soy sauce. I tried searching for the recipe on Blue Apron and found it! 

Here's what it looked like before (photo cred blue apron). I sadly didn't blog about it last year, but lately it's all I've been thinking about. Needless to say, I made my own little rendition tonight for dinner with steak instead, a few less veggies, and a different Asian noodle.

Ingredients:

2 NY Strip Steaks

5 Tablespoons Soy Sauce5 Tablespoons Rice Vinegar
2 Teaspoon Sesame Oil
12 Ounces Thin Rice Noodles
3 Scallions
1 Bag Corn
2 Pickling Cucumber
1 Bag Arugula Mix (half)

1 Tablespoon Sugar

1 oz EVOO

Salt & Pepper to taste

Directions:

Open meat packages, and salt and pepper both sides. Let sit to room temp. Wash and dry the fresh produce. To make the sauce, in a medium bowl, combine the sugar, sesame oil, ¾ of the rice vinegar, half the soy sauce and 1½ tablespoons of water; stir until the sugar dissolves. Cut off and discard the roots of the scallions; thinly slice them, separating the white bottoms and green tops. Heat up corn. Cut off and discard the ends of the cucumbers. Peel them. Halve the cucumbers lengthwise; scrape out and discard the seeds. Cut the cucumber lengthwise into ¼-inch strips; toss with half the remaining rice vinegar and black pepper (pictured below).

Add EVOO to a saute pan on med-high heat. Once the pan is hot, add the white part of the scallions and a minute or two later, add steaks to the EVOO and scallions. Cook for about 5 minutes on one side, flip and cook until your desired temperature (I probably cooked for 8-10 more minutes). I added a few tsps of the sauce to the top of the meat while it was cooking to get the flavors going. 

While the meat is cooking, boil some water. Add the rice noodles, and cook for about 4-5 minutes. Strain and add the rice noodles to the sauce. Toss. Plate the noodles, slice and plate the meat, and the vegetables. Drizzle with remaining sauce. Garnish with scallions.

 And zoomed in :)

Even though it's considerably below freezing outside, I wanted this summery dish. The protein, the vegetables and the overall freshness is something Baby C really wanted! I hope you have a chance to make this meal. Believe it or not, everything was quite simple - the hardest part was finding the ingredients. Good luck!

xo,

Shaz