Hiyashi-Chuuka with Gomadare

Hiyashi-chuuka with gomadare (sesame sauce)

Hiyashi chuuka is a one-dish meal. The cold noodles are served with a variety of vegetables and meat on top. You can really use anything, as long as it tastes good cold. Here I've used cucumber ribbons, some roast ham and pork slices thinly cut, and tomato. There's a bit of scrambled egg and some pickled sushi ginger too (since I was out of the brightly red beni sho-ga.) The key to bringing it all together is the slightly vinegary, sesame-rich dressing or gomadare. It's really a sort of pasta salad. Noodle shops in Japan don't serve hiyashi chuuka during the rest of the year, so the signs announcing "Now serving hiyashi chuuka" signal that summer has arrived.

Ingredients

1. 1 Tbs. rice vinegar or cider vinegar
2. 1 Tbs. soy sauce
3. 1 tsp. sugar
4. 2 Tbs. water, or chicken stock, or dashi stock (water with soup granules is fine here)
5. 2 Tbs raw sesame seeds, or 1 Tbs tahini
6. 2 tsp. dark sesame oil
7. 1 Tbs. dry mustard powder reconstituted with enough water to make a paste
8. 300g / 10 oz. dried Chinese egg noodles, or hiyashi chuuka noodles
9. 1 cucumber, cut into ribbons (see above)
10. 2 cups or so of thinly cut roast ham, or roast pork, or cooked chicken
11. 2 small tomatoes, de-seeded and cut into thin wedges
12. 1 scrambled egg (optional)
13. pickled sushi ginger (gari) or bright red pickled shredded ginger (beni sho-ga) (optional)

Directions

1. Toast the sesame seeds in a small pan until they start to pop. Remove from the heat immediately. In a mortar and pestle or a spice grinder, grind up the sesame roughly. Combine the sesame seeds or tahini, vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, water or stock, and sesame oil and mix well. Taste and adjust the amount of soy sauce, sugar or vinegar if needed.
2. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and cook the noodles of your choice in the water just until it's al dente. The cooking time will vary according to what kind of noodles you're using. Do not overcook the noodles.
3. Drain the noodles, then put them back in the pot. Fill the pot with cold running water, and rinse the noodles well until there's no starchiness to them. Drain well.
4. To serve, put a mound of noodles on each plate - plates with rims, or soup dishes, are ideal here. Arrange the vegetables, meat, egg and ginger attractively on top. Pour over the sauce. Serve a small dollop of the mustard on the side of the plate.
5. To eat, mix the noodles well, adding a bit of the mustard if desired.

Notes

Unlike Western style cold pasta dishes, where the noodles are meant to be cooled naturally, in Japanese cooking the noodles are rinsed repeatedly in cold water, to both cool them off and to get rid of any surface starch. If you're Italian the thought of rinsing noodles may make you shudder, but it's critical here.You actually scrub (gently, so you don't break the noodles) the strands under running water, until you don't feel any sort of stickiness on the surface. Once the noodles reach this state, you drain them thoroughly before proceeding. This washing stage is critical to making good Japanese (or Japanese-style Chinese) cold noodles.