Chicken Drunken Noodles Recipe – ก๋วยเตี๋ยวผัดขี้เมาไก่

Chicken Drunken Noodles

Chicken Drunken Noodles or in Thai ก๋วยเตี๋ยวผัดขี้เมา (Gwoy deaow pad kee mao) is an intriguing name for a noodle dish! So what does it mean? Why are they called Drunken Noodles? The answer is simple. They are one of Thailand’s most popular hangover cures! So whether you are hungover or not, here is my authentic Drunken noodles recipe 🙂

Chicken Drunken Noodles – Ideal For a Hangover

If you’ve had a heavy night out in Thailand and you’re feeling a bit ropy the next day then this noodle dish will sort you out. Because it’s incredibly spicy it makes you sweat out all the alcohol and toxins! At least that’s what everyone in Thailand thinks.

Regardless of whether you are hungover or not, Drunken Noodles are very tasty! Once you have all the ingredients, they are pretty easy to cook.

What Type of Noodles to Use?

For this Drunken Noodles recipe, I’m using wheat noodles. In Thailand, there are so many different types and sizes of noodles. The choice of noodles will vary depending on where you are in Thailand. The one unwritten rule with Drunken noodles is that you never use very thin glass noodles. Apart from that use whatever you can find.

Wheat noodles are great because you buy them dry and then soak them in boiling water whenever you need them.

Just soak them in boiling water for a couple of minutes until they become soft. Take them out of the water and let them cool down before you cook with them. This is very important if you use them straight away they will stick together!

If you don’t like wheat noodles or you are gluten intolerant another alternative is egg noodles. You can usually find these in most supermarkets and they are ready to cook with so you don’t have to worry about boiling them or anything.

Another choice is fresh rice noodles if you can find them at your local Asian store.

Authentic Chicken Drunken Noodles Recipe -ก๋วยเตี๋ยวผัดขี้เมาไก่

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon of cooking oil
• 300g of sliced chicken breast – You don’t have to use chicken. Drunken noodles can be made with pork, beef and seafood. You can also make it vegetarian if you want.
• 200g dry wheat noodles – Rice noodles or egg noodles can also so used. I’ve used wheat noodles because they are easy to find here in the UK.

• 30 g red & green peppers
• 50 g Chinese leaf
• 20 g carrots
• 20 g mange tout – peppers, mange tout, Chinese leaf and carrots are my preferred vegetables but you can use whatever you like though or whatever you have lying around in your fridge! Just make sure you add the appropriate amount.
• 2 cloves of garlic – Very important. You can’t skip this ingredient!
• 5 Thai bird-eye chillies – Every drunken noodle recipe is spicy! If you don’t like spicy noodles then there are plenty of other noodle dishes you can make!! Bird’s eye chillies have a unique flavour but if you can’t find any you can substitute them for another type of chilli 🙂
• 100g of fresh basil leaves – If you can get find Thai holy basil, use that. It’s not easy to find so you can always substitute it for some ordinary basil. Just make sure it’s fresh.

• 2 tablespoons of fish sauce – Fish sauce is so important in Thai cooking. It provides such a unique flavour. If you don’t have any or if you are vegetarian you can add half a teaspoon of salt instead.
• 2 tablespoons of oyster sauce
• 1 tablespoon of sugar
• A pinch of pepper
• 2 teaspoons of dry basil – I like to add this as it adds a bit more flavour. It’s optional though
• 1 tablespoon seasoning sauce
• 1 tablespoon cooking wine – This is optional but I always like to put some cooking wine in my drunken noodles to add more flavour

Seasoning Sauce – What is it?

Thai seasoning sauce is a salty brown sauce which is similar to soy sauce. The difference is that seasoning sauce has a much more intense taste and more saltier.

in Thailand, there are two main brands, Healthy Boy and Golden Mountain. I use Golden Mountain but Healthy Boy is just as good so it doesn’t really matter.

Seasoning sauce really is the secret ingredient of so many Thai recipes. It might not be so well known in the West, but it’s been used in Thailand for well over a century. If you’re planning on cooking Thai food then you need this in your cupboard!

Instructions

1. Boil a saucepan of water. When the water is boiling put the dry wheat noodles in. Gently boil the noodles for 7 minutes. Use a cullender or sieve to drain the water then rinse under the cold tap until cool.
2. Finely chop the chilli and garlic
3. Slice the mange tout, carrots, Chinese leaf and peppers (Or whatever vegetables you decided to use)
4. Cut the chicken breast (Or other meat) into thin bite-sized pieces
5. Heat the wok and put the cooking oil in
6. Add the crushed chilli and garlic and stir fry until they begin to change colour
7. Add the chicken or whatever meat you decided on and stir fry until partly cooked
8. Add oyster sauce, fish sauce, seasoning sauce and sugar. Stir fry and mix together
9. Add the cooking wine and continue stirring
10. Add a bit of water or stock water to keep things moist
11. Add dry basil and let it simmer for around 30 seconds
12. Add peppers, carrots and mangetout and stir everything in
13. Put the noodles in followed by the Chinese leaf – Chinese leaf doesn’t take long to cook so put it in near the end
14. Stir everything for 1 minute
15. Turn the heat off and add the fresh basil – The basil doesn’t need a strong heat. Just let the residual heat from the wok soften up the leaves
16. Stir everything in or toss the wok if you can!
17. Plate up your noodles and you’re done