I love getting drunken noodles or drunken noodle-type of dishes at thai restaurants. I’m a sucker for any dish with thick rice noodles and a sweet and savory sauce. I decided I was ready to make my own! After scouring countless recipes and watching youtube videos, I was ready for my experiment. And hey, it worked out really well! Surprisingly well. I had no idea it would actually be this easy!

Thai Style Drunken Noodles

2 cloves garlic chopped
1 small shallot chopped
2 eggs
Veggies of your choice
Meat of your choice
1 pkg of fresh thick rice noodles
2 tomatoes
Thai basil
Chili pepper, if you want
1-2 tbsp soy sauce
1-2 tbsp oyster sauce
1-2 tbsp fish sauce
1-2 tbsp sugar

So this particular “recipe” was what I used to make one package of the soft noodles. But really, you can make as much or as little as you want and just experiment with the ingredients. If you don’t like certain things, just leave it out. If you want to add things, go right ahead!

In some hot oil, cook up the chopped garlic and shallots until cooked and fragrant. What does “fragrant” mean anyway? Scoot them over to the side of the pan and add your eggs, and scramble them.

Add veggies of your choice, I used red bell pepper, onion, and broccoli. Since these are crunchy veggies, you’ll need to cook a bit longer. Cook these as much as you want, to the crunchiness that you want. If you want to take this mixture and put them aside in a bowl, go ahead. I had to because the pan I was using was just too small.

You can use whatever meat you want. I used cooked shrimp (again, because due to sheer laziness) so I didn’t really have to cook these very much. But whatever meat you use (pork, chicken, shrimp, etc) once your meat is cooked, add the noodles and heat up until the noodles get soft. If you had set aside the veggie mixture, put it back into the pan now. Mix the sauce ingredients together (the three sauces and the sugar, however much you want, just use a one-to-one ratio of all) and then pour it over everything. Stir everything together so that the sauce coats everything. If you like spice, add whatever chili that you want.

The last thing to add would be the chopped tomatoes (which I totally forgot to add) and the basil. If you have fresh basil, add that. I’m not sure how much, maybe like a handful. I cheated and bought a jar of chopped thai basil and added just about a teaspoon or even less. It worked just as well.

Now eat! Just a note about the noodles… I’m sure you could use dried noodles too, but I just don’t think it would be as good. I love these type of noodles because they’re thick and chewy, and I just don’t think a dried rice noodle would work all that great. It just wouldn’t have the right texture and probably wouldn’t soak up the flavors as well. So if you can find them at your asian market, try to get the fresh ones!

I was called for jury duty again. I find it to be extremely frustrating. Not because I have anything against my civic duty. I’ve actually served on a jury. I was even the foreperson. I found it actually quite interesting. I just find the process of jury selection so terribly time-consuming and inefficient. It should be quick. But instead, you spend most of your time just sitting. Then you sit some more. And then a bit more. Ok, enough yammering. Eventually, after my belly started eating itself, they excused us for lunch. So I walked myself down to Nooddi. It turns out to be a little local chain, with 6 locations in total in the delaware valley. They have a nice lunch special deal so that’s what I went with. For my soup I got the ravioli soup, which included two shrimp and chicken dumplings, mixed veggies, and a light broth. This was pretty decent. The dumplings were tasty and the veggies were nice and fresh. The broth was very light, not greasy, like typical wonton style soups.

For my appetizer, I got the thai salad (som tam), which was supposed to be shredded cabbage, carrots, tomatoes, and peanut tossed with Thai seasoning lime juice. There was definitely cabbage and carrots, but I had one small piece of tomato and no peanuts. And the thai seasoning lime juice was pretty much just fish sauce slightly watered down a bit. I think they could have done a lot better. And that could have started with giving me a bit more tomato and you know, actually having peanuts. And I tasted no lime. But I’m pretty much a big sucker for any type of cabbage salad, so I still enjoyed it.

For my entree, I went with the Pad Se Ew. Chicken, wide jumbo rice noodles, veggies, and egg, in a sweet soy seasoning. This type of noodle dish is my crack. I just love it so. It’s so easy and simple, with such few ingredients, but they just work so well together. I love the soft earthiness of the noodles and the slight crunch of the lightly stir fried veggies. Although, I’m not a big fan of baby corn. They could have totally left that out! Service was ok. It was a little later than typical lunch time so it wasn’t very crowded. And my food came out pretty quick. It’s a nice option for the downtown Media crowd.

Ok, so I technically wasn’t eating with the NYPD, but I was eating with people that were working with the NYPD, so by the associative property, I was practically eating lunch with the NYPD. We took a short walk from the NYPD police academy to Lantern, a thai joint.
It’s a cool and sleek place. Modern and shiny, with living trees on the inside!
They have a kick ass $8 lunch special. Who knew you could find such bargains in NYC for lunch? And it’s not from a truck, it’s a proper sit-down joint. The special comes with your choice of appetizer. J and L got these dumplings. Man, these look… toothsome.

I got the spring rolls, because I’m drawn to fried appetizers in thai restaurants. It’s like a sickness. These little babies were hot and tasty.

Everyone ended up getting a noodle dish of some kind. Three of us got drunken noodles. L got chicken, J got shrimp, and I got calimari. M got the pad se-ew, which is pretty much just like drunken noodles, except not spicy, so not drunken. I love me some drunken noodles. I love thick rice noodles and I love the kick of spice in this dish. It’s never too much, it’s just enough spice to go with the sweet. And when given the option, I love squid in pretty much any form. A lovely thai meal for lovely little prices!