Thai Peanut Noodles Recipe - Crunchy Creamy Sweet (2024)

FAQs

Can you use regular spaghetti noodles for lo mein? ›

Let's Talk About Lo Mein Noodles

I could not find it at any of my regular places, so in its place I have used either dry ramen if you can find it (as long as you're hitting up Amazon for the soy sauce, grab a box of this ramen, too – affiliate link) and/or just regular spaghetti.

Peanut butter noodles might sound like an Americanised version of a Chinese dish, and you can find this item on menus all around New York's Chinatown, but its origins don't lie there. The dish, made from a ground peanut sauce, hails from Shaxian, in the south-eastern coastal province of Fujian.

Pad Thai is a Thai noodle stir fry with a sweet-savoury-sour sauce scattered with crushed peanuts. It's made with thin, flat rice noodles, and almost always has bean sprouts, garlic chives, scrambled egg, firm tofu and a protein – the most popular being chicken or prawns/shrimp.

If you are unable to find noodles that are specifically labeled as chow mein noodles or lo mein noodles, you can use linguine noodles, regular Italian spaghetti noodles, or another type of Asian noodle as a similar substitute.

Lo mein noodles are soft and chewy, making them excellent at soaking up flavors. This quality ensures that every bite is comforting and packed with taste. They pair well with sauces, creating a yummy mix of flavors. In contrast, spaghetti is known for its firm and satisfying chew, which pasta lovers enjoy.

—Tamarind: This sour, sweet, and tangy fruit is the most important ingredient for achieving that true pad Thai flavor. For this version, we opted for tamarind puree, but tamarind paste will work too (make sure it's a product of Thailand rather than India).

Traditional pad thai is made with peanuts and peanut butter, however you can easily substitute nuts like cashews or almonds (peanuts are a legume, whereas almonds and cashews are tree nuts). My oil-free vegan pad thai is made nut-free with pumpkin seeds.

It can definitely be a part of a balanced, well-rounded diet. While pad thai includes many nutritious ingredients, its sodium content is considerably high. You can reduce its sodium by requesting the eatery go easy on the sauce and salt-contributing condiments.

No problem. Though the dish won't be traditional, Italian noodles can make a good stand-in for Asian noodles if that's what you have on hand. All you need are a few heavy-hitting pantry staples to strike the right balance of sweet, savory, salty and umami.

Here's a little trick that feels like an edible science experiment, but the result is pretty good! If you don't have a package of ramen on-hand, “ramenize” your spaghetti by adding baking soda to a pot of water. It adds alkali, which is what gives ramen its chewy, bouncy texture and yellowish hue.

What's the difference between chowmein and spaghetti? ›

Pasta is a type of noodle which is specifically made from durum wheat (or made to look like it is). Spaghetti is made from durum wheat so is a pasta. Chowmein is stir fried noodles, which may be made of rice or any other grain. In principle then chowmein could be stir fried spaghetti, but that's rare.

“Lo mein” translates to “tossed noodles.” As with chow mein, the noodle itself is egg-based. The noodles are boiled or parboiled, then added to a mixture of vegetables and protein cooked in a broth or sauce. The noodles are usually added toward the end of preparing the dish, and then everything is tossed together.