Recipe Background
White-Box Lo Mein combines pantry staples for a quick, flavorful first apartment meal.
Years ago, I moved into my first ever apartment with a couple of friends. It was a shoestring-budget kind of living, but we made it work. One night, after an exhausting day unpacking boxes, we realized none of us had thought about dinner. A quick scavenge of the half-empty fridge revealed some carrots, a lonely onion, and a pack of shiitake mushrooms; I took this as fate. Lo mein was going to be our first meal in our communal space. Luckily, I always kept a stash of lo mein noodles in my pantry, reserved for just such occasions. Digging deeper, I uncovered bottles of soy sauce and hoisin sauce, relics from my last grocery run.
Cooking up that first sizzling meal taught me that great flavors emerge from humble beginnings. As the vegetables hit the hot oil, my friends and I swapped stories and shared monosyllabic laughs over the sizzle. Tossing in the shredded cabbage and sliced mushrooms, I suggested using a whisk for the sauce to make sure the brown sugar dissolved completely. Letting the cooked noodles briefly rest before mixing, we made sure everything absorbed the dark, savory sauce.
That improvised lo mein became a tradition, revisited whenever nostalgia hit. It wasn’t just about making a meal; it mingled with the stories of the first place we called home together, its simple ingredients echoing a time of newfound independence and camaraderie.
Ingredients
For the noodles and sauce:
- 1 (16-ounce) package lo mein noodles
- 1 tablespoon brown sugar packed
- 2 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
- 2 tablespoons dark soy sauce
- 1 tablespoon oyster sauce
- 1 teaspoon hoisin sauce
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 teaspoon sesame oil
For the chicken:
- 1 pound chicken breasts boneless and skinless, cut into small pieces
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon fresh ginger minced
- 3 cloves garlic minced
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
For the vegetables:
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 cups shiitake mushrooms sliced
- 1 cup Chinese cabbage shredded
- 1 cup carrots julienned
- 1 large onion chopped
- 3 green onions chopped, for garnish
Directions
- In a large pot of salted, boiling water, add the noodles and cook according to the package directions.
- Drain the noodles and set them aside.
- In a small bowl, add the brown sugar, 2 tablespoons of the soy sauce, the dark soy sauce, the oyster sauce, the hoisin sauce, the ground black pepper, and the sesame oil and whisk to combine.
- In a medium-sized bowl, add the chicken pieces, the remaining soy sauce, the ginger, and the garlic and toss to combine.
- In a large wok or a large skillet, heat 2 tablespoons of the olive oil.
- Add the chicken pieces to the hot oil and cook, while stirring occasionally, until the chicken starts to brown and reaches an internal temperature of 165 degrees F, about 5 minutes. You may need to cook the chicken in batches to avoid overcrowding the wok.
- Transfer the cooked chicken to a plate.
- Add the remaining olive oil to the wok over high heat and allow it to heat.
- Add the mushrooms, the cabbage, the carrots, and the onions to the hot oil and cook, while stirring vigorously, for 1 minute.
- Add the cooked chicken, the cooked noodles, and the sauce mixture to the vegetable mixture and toss to combine.
- Serve garnished with the green onions.
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