Naengmyeon (cold noodles)

Cold noodles / 물냉면 / 비빔냉면 / Naengmyeon (or naeng myeon, naeng-myeon, naengmyun, naeng-myun)

• Categories: cold, main dish, noodle, soup, spicy
• Made with: apple vinegar, bosc pear, buckwheat noodles, corn syrup, cucumber, eggs, garlic, ginger, green onion, hot pepper flakes, hot pepper paste, mustard powder, onion, salt, sesame oil, sesame seeds, soy sauce, sugar,
• Watch on YouTube - 163,421 views and rated 5 stars out of 5 based on 674 ratings
• Read the Wikipedia entry for this recipe
• Originally posted on June 2, 2008 at 9:40 pm by Maangchi and published in Cooking Korean Food with Maangchi - Book 2

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Naengmyeon (“cold noodles”) are made from buckwheat noodles. It’s a very popular dish in Korea all year ’round but especially in summertime. I’m going to introduce you to 2 kinds of naengmyeon: mulnaengmyeon and bibimnaengmyeon, both using yeolmu mul kimchi from the recipe in my previous video.

Mulnaengmyeon are soup-based noodles served in a cold icy broth. Bibimnaengmyeon is served in a hot and spicy sauce without much soup broth at all. Naengmyeon is my favorite food. I love the texture of the chewy noodles. After eating icy cold noodles on a hot summer day, you will feel your body temperature cool right down.

Ingredients:

• a package of buckwheat noodles (4 servings)
• onion
• garlic
• green onions
• ginger
• cucumber
• egg
• 1 pear
• hot pepper flakes
• hot pepper paste
• sesame seeds
• vinegar
• sesame oil
• corn syrup,
• salt
• soy sauce
• sugar
• mustard powder

Directions:

A package of Korean buckwheat noodles usually comes with soup powder packet. If you want to make a quick broth, you can simply mix the soup powder with cold water. If you want to make homemade stock, this is how I do it.

Make stock for mulnaengmyeon:

1. Boil 8 cups of water with 3-4 shiitake mushrooms, a 4 inch piece of dried kelp, and 8-10 dried anchovies with the heads and the intestines removed for 20 minutes over hight heat.
2. Lower the heat to low and cook another 20 minutes. Cool it down and keep it in the refrigerator.

Prepare toppings:

1. Mustard paste (optional):
   Mix 2 tbs of mustard powder and 1 tbs water. Put it in a warm place to ferment it for 5 minutes. Set aside.
2. Cucumber:
   Slice 1 cup’s worth of cucumber into thin strips. Add a pinch of salt, 1 ts of sugar, and 1 ts of vinegar. Mix it up and and set it aside.
3. Pear:
   Slice 1 cup’s worth into thin strips. You can use either Korean pear or bosc pear. Soak it in water and add 1 ts sugar so it doesn’t change color. Set it aside.
4. Egg:
   Hardboil an egg, cut it in half, and set it aside.

Make hot and spicy sauce for bibimnaengmyeon (skip this if you only want to make mulnaengmyon)

1. Blend 1 cup’s worth of peeled pear, about ¼ cups’ worth of onion, 1 ts garlic, 1 ts ginger, ⅓ cup of corn or rice syrup, ¼ cup hot pepper flakes, 2 tbs hot pepper paste, 1 tbs sesame seeds, 3 green onions, 2 ts of salt, and 1 tbs soy sauce. Keep in the refrigerator.

Make the noodles

1. Put a package of buckwheat noodles into a big pot of boiling water. Stir them with a wooden spoon so that the noodles don’t stick to each other. Keep boiling for about 3-5 minutes until cooked.
2. When the noodles are cooked, move the pot to the sink and pour cold water over them. Drain some of the water out and pour more cold water over them again. This will help the noodles get chewier.
3. Rinse and drain the noodles a couple of times until not slippery.  Put the noodles into a basket or colander.

To make mulnaengmyeon

1. For each serving you need to make, mix 2 cups of stock in a bowl with 2 ts vinegar, 1 ts salt, and 2 ts sugar. Add more vinegar to taste. Add 5-7 ice cubes to make it even colder.
2. Place noodles in a bowl and add the cold broth, cucumber, pear, mustard paste, and egg on top. Serve cold. If you have kimchi juice or young summer radish kimchi, add some to the noodle soup. It will taste even better!

To make bibimnaengmyeon:

1. Put some noodles into a serving bowl.
2. Add some hot and spicy sauce, pear, cucumber, mustard paste, and half a hardboiled egg on top.
3. Drizzle about 1 ts of sesame oil over top, add some ice cubes to the bowl, and serve cold.

Posted Monday, June 2nd, 2008 at 9:40 pm
Tagged: bibim naengmyeon, cold noodle soup, cold noodles, 물냉면 비빔냉면, 냉면, Korean buckwheat noodle soup, korean cooking, korean cuisine, korean food, korean recipe, Korean recipes, Maangchi, Maangchi recipes, mulnaengmyeon, mulnaengmyun, naengmyeon, naengmyun, recipes, spicy noodles