Years ago a friend took me to a Southeast Asian restaurant that had the most incredible garlic noodles I have ever eaten. When these garlic noodles were brought to our table, they looked like the plainest bowl of noodles you could imagine, but then I had a bite and was treated to such tantalizingly garlicky goodness that I’ve never forgotten those noodles. When a recipe for “Asian” garlic noodles was trending online, my hopes were high that it would be the recipe I was looking for to re-create that garlic noodle magic. But I was disappointed – people raved about how parmesan in the recipe added umami that really amped up those noodles, but I found the parmesan took over the dish and gave it more of an Italian flavor than an Asian one. So I set out to figure it out on my own. I decided I could use miso for that umami punch. It worked exactly as I’d hoped… I’d finally found my magic guessipe for the plainest-looking but most garlic-infused noodles ever.
Guessipe
- 6 oz dried Chinese noodles, cooked to al dente, 1/2 cup of noodle cooking water reserved
- 4 TBSP butter
- 10 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
- 1 tsp brown sugar
- 1 TBSP miso
- 1 TBSP oyster sauce
- 1 TBSP soy sauce
- 1 tsp sesame oil
Melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add the garlic and cook 4 minutes.
Stir in the brown sugar, miso, oyster sauce, soy sauce, and sesame oil. Cook for 1 more minute.
Toss in the cooked pasta, adding spoonfuls of the noodle cooking water as necessary to evenly coat the noodles in sauce. They won’t be much to look at, but trust me… take a bite.
