Stir fry rice noodle

A lot of people ask me what's the difference between Chinese food and Taiwanese food. That like asking what's the difference between fast food and Wendy's. Most American don't realize that there are a lot of different variety of Chinese food. Unfortunately, most Chinese restaurants in US serve pretty much similar stuffs, that there is no way for them to understand that northern China, southern China, or even Taiwan all has it own unique cousin.
In Taiwan, we have all kind of Chinese food. Especial in Taipei, you can find a Szechwan restaurant right next to a Shanghai restaurant. And people in Taiwan know what to expect when they go to one versus the other. Since people in Taiwan are mostly emigrants came from some part of China some time in the past, Chinese food in Taiwan, contain almost all the possible Chinese food. Every time people ask me what is Taiwanese food, I have trouble to come up with one dish that's not a specialty of some other part of China. Until I think of rice noodle.
Although rice is a staple of Chinese cousin, most of noodle in Chinese food are still made of wheat flour. And rice noodle seems to be used mostly in Taiwan. One time I was talking about rice noodle with a friend who is from HongKong. And I found the rice noodle he was talking about is totally different from what I have in mind.
Cooking the rice noodle is actually rather simple if you know how to stir fry. Since this is a dish can be verified easily, I am going to write the recipe without the firm ingredients and portion.

Stir fry rice noodle

Vegetable: cabbage, onion, carrot, pea, bean, broccoli...anything you think would taste good in stir fry
Mushroom
Meat: any sort of meat good for stir fry, generally small pieces for quick cooking
Rice noodle: You can get them in the Chinese stores. There are two kind of rice noodle. One thin and one thick. For stir fry we normally use the thin one. If you use the thick one, it need to be pre-boiled. I only get the one from Taiwan. Don't ask me why.
Seasoning: salt, ground white pepper, soy sauce, cooking wine, vinegar....you don't need all of them, as long as it taste good, it would be fine.
Flavor: garlic, ginger, cilantro, basil....It depends on what you are cooking and what kind of flavor you try to achieve.

So the basic way of cooking rice noodle is to do a quick stir fry of veggies and meat. It is good to have some liquid with the stir fry since the noodle would absorb the liquid. If the stir fry is dry, add a bit of water before adding the noodle. Pre-soak the noodle in cold water for about 10 minutes. Add the noodle(without water) to the stir fry. Cook until the noodle is done. (try a piece to see how it taste.) If it needs some more seasoning, add some more salt or soy sauce (vinegar, wine optional.) You might need to add more water from time to time, so the noodle can cook through. Avoid put in too much water at once, unless you are making the noddle soup.

For example: to make vegetarian mushroom/cabbage rice noodle, I would cut the mushroom in slices and chop the cabbage in small pieces. I would also add a little bit of sliced carrot to make the color more pleasing. Also some onion for flavor. Start by heating the oil and quick stir fry the onion and carrot, because they take longer time to cook. When they are half cooked, add the cabbage and add the salt to season at this point. Add the mushroom the last since it doesn't take much time to cook at all. Season with soy sauce and a little bit of cooking wine. You need to over seasoned at this stage otherwise the noodle will be flavorless. If it is still dry, add about half cup of water. As soon as everything is close to done (or still a little bit under cooked) add the soaked rice noodle. Keep stirring to mix everything well. Try a small piece of noodle to see if the noodle is done and if it needs more seasoning.

For stir fry meat, cut meat into thin slices. Pre-marinate the meat. (Chicken with wine and salt, beef or pork with soy sauce, vinegar and wine) To keep the meat tender, you can add a egg white and some corn starch. Heat some oil in a pan with high heat.( you would need quite a bit of oil here) Part cook the meat, take them out of the pan as soon as the serface is cookes. Then cook the vegetable stir fry. Add the meat back in when the vegetable are about done. This way, the meat doesn't get over cooked.