Wall Street

Noodlin'

Author: photograph by Christopher Hirsheimer
Just back from Singapore, I worried: Could I find the right noodles to make authentic Singapore dishes in the U.S.? I asked Chris Yeo, of San Francisco’s Straits Cafe, for help. He took me to Chinatown, where we bought bundles of smooth, beige, spaghetti-like Chinese wheat-flour noodles (sometimes called chow mein or just Chinese noodles), fresh and dried, to be stir-fried, deep-fried, or used in soup. He found fresh kway teow, flat sheets of rice-flour noodle for wrapping seafood or meat, and fettuccine-cut kway teow to use in soups. Finally, we found bee hoon, dried Chinese rice vermicelli (“rice stick noodles”), wiry and brittle, which are deep-fried or, after soaking, stir-fried or added to soup. I was happy. I had everything I needed.

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