Page 7 - Cooking away from China - Cookbook by Catherine Liu

Hot dry spaghetti

Re Gan Mian

This is the very first traditional dish I recreated, and I found it so
simple yet delicious that it worths its place as the first recipe.

The cooking part is as basic as boiling - the soul is the sauce -
specifically, spring onion and peanut butter, which give you the
authentic taste. Still, the chewy texture of spaghetti makes it an
ideal substitute for the original noodles.

Wuhan cuisine 1 pan & 1 bowl 15 minutes boiling

What to Prepare How to Make It

olive oil 1. Get a pan of salted water on to boil.
salt 2. Add spaghetti until well cooked - this

water may take maximum 12 minutes.
a handful of dried 3. Whilst waiting for the spaghetti, I'd like

spaghetti to prepare for the 'soul' - add peanut
1 tbsp peanut butter butter and soy sauce in a bowl and stir.

2 tbsp soy sauce (light) 4. When spaghetti is ready, reserve some
1/2 cup chopped spring of the cooking water, add spaghetti to
onion, to serve the bowl and pour in a little of the

optional: vegetable, reserved pasta water to help dilute the
shrimp sauce.

5. Scatter spring onion, stir until the
spaghetti is all coated with the sauce

and slurp it like they do in Wuhan!

My final words

For the peanut butter - I prefer crunchy peanut butter would
work better than the smoothy, because the peanuts would add
another texture to your spaghetti.
You may substitute the peanut butter for Tahini/ sesame - but
it would be the best if you have both (of course!)
Coriander is also a common component of this dish, but it can
be skipped if you haven't got it on hand. Just never forget the
spring onion!

A Taste of the Home Country 7