Mee Siam
Every time I tell my mom I am making mee siam, she’ll remind me to use Taocheo. But ma! I have been cooking for more than 30 years?! Yet, you know what, it is such a blessing to have a mother to nag at you even at this age. My mum is 80 years old.
I am not sure why we call this Mee Siam, as if it originates from Siam or Thailand. I have never seen any Thai noodle dish that is close to this version.
Mee Siam is a common street food in Singapore and Malaysia. However, in Singapore, ours is more soupy while those we get in Malaysia tend to be the dry versions. I like the Singaporean version much better. In addition, I like to have a whole spoonful of fried dried prawns as toppings rather than having them incorporated into the soup.
So here’s my version. Really good and a comfort food for most Singaporeans.
Mee Siam
- Prep
- 0 min
- Cook
- 0 min
- Total
- 0 min
- Serves
- 0
Ingredients
- 200 gBee Hoon, fine rice noodles (soaked in cold water for 30 minutes)
- 1litre Stock
- 2 TbspCooking Oil, sunflower, canola, peanut etc
- 3 tbspAsam (mixed with 3 tbsp water and drain
- 2 TbspSugar
- Salt and lime juice to taste
- 3bunches Chinese Chives, finely chopped
- 20Prawns, blanched
- 5Hardboiled eggs, sliced
- 5Taupok, diced to 5 mm and toasted
- 6 TbspDried prawns, soaked for 30 minutes, dried, pounded and then fried till crispy
- A handful of Taugay or bean sprouts
- 10Dried Chilies, soaked and then cut to thumb length
- 9 clovesGarlic
- 1Big Onion
- 1 TbspBelachan or Prawn paste
- 2 TbspTaucheo or miso paste
- 5buah kerak
Method
- 01Grind all the ingredients for the spice paste together.
- 02Heat up a stock pot and cooking oil. Add the spice paste and stir over medium heat until it is fragrant. This takes 10 minutes, so be patient or the mee siam will not be delicious.
- 03Scoop up 1/3 of the paste and put that into another pot.
- 04Onto the 2/3 of the paste, add 1 litre of stock, assam juice, sugar and salt. Bring to a boil.
- 05Add prawns to the pot and when cooked, remove the prawns to be used for toppings.
- 06Add the noodles to the 1/3 of the paste that was reserved, stir through and mix until even.
- 07Put noodles into five bowls, arrange toppings on the noodles, and scoop the gravy over the noodles.
- 08Serve with a wedge of lime and/or more sambal chili.