Spicy Stir Fry Noodles

Living with a fickle eater is a challenge.  We are constantly trying to get the Tiny American to eat something besides goldfish and M&M's. I know some would subscribe to the theory that if we just stopped offering him goldfish as an option he would eat other things....thanks, but he would rather starve!  He would just rather not eat.  I worry about it and about that time we will have a day where he eats  everything we put in front of him and then there are days when he eats nothing we put in front of him; on those days I think goldfish are better than nothing. I have tried sneaky ways of getting his fruits and veggies into his tummy, but if he doesn't want to eat I can't actually force it in his mouth.  He seems to be thriving and so we will assume he is getting at least enough of the good stuff and hope that at some point he becomes a more consistent eater.

One thing that he does like is stir fried noodles.  We have a favorite restaurant here that makes them and when I'm not in the mood to cook, they are one of our go to places. Their version has ground pork and big pieces of scallion in a brown sauce, they are yummy!  They are simple to make and I have tweaked a recipe to be more to our taste, we like things a little spicy, even the Tiny American likes spicy.  Last night when I made this recipe I used broccoli and red pepper for my veggies.  You could use what ever you have on hand that you would normally add to a stir fry.  Usually I would just coarse chop my veggies, but I decided to chop these really small with my Pampered Chef food chopper.  I hoped that they would stick to the noodles a little better and would make their way into his tummy without him even knowing! It worked pretty well.  I also used ground pork for this recipe, but ground chicken would work as well, for us ,the smaller the meat the easier it is for him to eat and the ground variety sticks to the noodles.

One thing that I have learned about doing a stir fry is to make sure you have everything measured and ready to go before you start.  I measure everything out and line it up on the counter in the order it goes into the pan.  My second piece of advice is to make sure your wok or whatever you are cooking in is HOT.  You don't want your oil to smoke, but you want it almost to that point. With a tiny bit of prep this is a super speedy meal to get on the table.  If you try these let me know what you think OR when you visit us in Taiwan I will make them for you!

Spicy Stir Fry Noodles

Ingredients
1/2 pound ground pork
rice noodles ( boiled and ready to use) I buy a medium width flat noodle
chopped veggies of your choice
2 cloves of garlic minced
2 eggs beaten
pinch ground white pepper
3 Tbsp veg oil

For the Sauce:
2 Tbsp Dark Soy sauce
3 Tbsp Light Soy sauce
1 Tbsp Oyster sauce
1 Tbsp Hot Chilli Sauce ( you can leave this out or add more depending on how hot you want it)

Heat your oil up in your wok/skillet.  Cook egg just until set and remove from the pan.  Cook garlic and  pork until pork is no longer pink.  Add veggies to the pan cook until they are to desired tenderness, we like ours crispy so it doesn't long.  Pour the sauce into your pork and veggie mixture and then stir in the noodles letting everything blend and warm through.  Add the egg back in, stirring to break it up.

You could always add a little red pepper flake if you really want to bring the heat up.  I wouldn't recommend that if you are sharing it with you toddler, the pepper seeds tend to make their eyes water!

I hope you try it and like it as much as we do!