Here are a few snap shots and notes I took on how to prepare Jap Jae, its a Korean starch noodle dish. Meat is optional, you can heat up slices of beef with garlic and olive oil in separate pan and then mix them in with the noodles.
Ingredients:
1 package Korean Starch Noodle (Korean Vermicelli, Sweet Potato Starch)
1/2 Chopped Onion
1 Bag of Spinach
1 cup Sliced Mushrooms
1 Sliced Red Pepper (or green or both)
1 cup sliced Carrots (like in photo provided above)
Salt
Sesame Oil
Sesame Seeds
Olive Oil
Soy Sauce
Minced Garlic
1. Boil Water. In a bowl empty the bag of Spinach leaves, when water comes to a boil pour the water over the leaves and gently stir leaves in the water. You are basically blanching the spinach leaves. Pour the leaves into a strainer and then squeeze out all of the excess moisture with your hands. Put the leaves back into the bowl. Roughly add 1/4 tsp of salt, 1 tsp of sesame oil and 1 1/2 tsp of sesame seeds. Mix together. You basically need to season this to taste.
2. In a large pot boil water. Add the noodles and turn off the heat but leave the pot on the burner. Stir and cover for about 15 minutes. Drain. Cut Noodles with scissors. Add enough Olive oil to coat the bottom of the pot. Turn the burner back on to Medium High heat. Add the noodles and stir them until they are well coated with the Olive oil. Add soy sauce until they are "the right shade of brown". (please use the photo provided as a reference). Add 1 tablespoon of sugar. Mix and season this with the soy sauce and sugar to taste (these noodles are not supposed to be sweet the sugar just balances out the saltiness of the soy sauce). Remember that if you under season you can always add more, but if you add too much you can't take any out.
3. In a large Pan coat with Olive Oil over Medium High heat. Add a tablespoon of minced garlic (GARLIC IS GOOD!) First add the Onion. After about a minute add the Carrots and Peppers, After another minute add the Mushrooms. You don't want to cook these veggies too long, you want to have a fresh crisp taste.
4. Meanwhile, add A LOT of Sesame oil to the noodles, enough to coat them and season with salt and pepper to taste. This takes a little muscle to stir really well and it also takes a lot of sampling to get them seasoned to your preference.
5. Add spinach to the noodles. Turn off the heat and add the sauteed veggies to the noodles. If you decided to add beef to your noodles, you would add them here as well and stir it all together. Top with sesame seed and serve.
