A Taste of Soup Noodle in Luzhou

Home ＞The Making of Soup Noodle ＞Introduction

Introduction to Soup Noodle

The Secret of Delicious Soup Noodle During this activity, we visited three Soup Noodle shops—Asan Soup Noodle, Damiaokou Soup Noodle, and Alang Soup Noodle. All their shop owners were very enthusiastic and gave us a lot of suggestions. The three Soup Noodle shops boasted their own characteristics and the common features of elastic and chewy noodles and rich and sweet-smelling soup which were the charm of Soup Noodle! Soup and noodles are the soul and keys of Soup Noodle. Fortunately, the shop owners were selflessly explaining their specific recipes in detail.

The Secret of Noodle
Different from average white noodles, the noodle of Soup Noodle is yellow, which is also known as oil noodle. Why is it yellow? It's because alkali power is added in the process of making the noodle like alkali zongzi (a traditional Chinese rice-pudding）. Also, alkali power enhances the fragrance and al dente taste of the noodle.
While observing the cooking process by the shop owners, we found a special action—using a big colander with a handle to shake the noodle up and down in boiling water to shake off the excess water. The action is pronounced as "chhek (摵)" in Hokkien. That is how the name "chhek-a-mi (摵仔麵)" came into being. Later, "Soup Noodle" with homophonic sounds as chhek-a-mi was used to name the noodle.
Now most Soup Noodle shop owners in Luzhou use stainless colander to cook the noodle, but Mr. Chen, the owner of Asan Soup Noodle Shop, insists in using a bamboo colander. Mr. Chen believes that by following traditional noodle cooking techniques with the traditional tool, he can blend the faint scent of bamboo in the noodle which cannot be done by an iron one.
Though he must replace a new bamboo colander every month, he still insists in offering the most traditional Soup Noodle to his customers. We could feel Mr. Chen's perseverance and beliefs of traditional culture.

The Secret of Soup
Mr. Chen told me that, soup was the soul of a bowl of Soup Noodle. Though each shop had its own method, they followed similar key points. First, soup must be cooked in the early morning with fresh and local pork bones and streaky pork in boiling water for six hours.To add the sweet-smelling of the soup with MSG, another "soup of assorted fruits" should be prepared, including apple, orange, western celery, onion, and so on.
We also found that as long as a customer wanted to have appetizers boiling in soup, Mr. Chen would boil them in the rich sou. No wonder Mr. Chen said, some gastronomes that preferred full-bodied soup would come to the shop around two or three o'clock in the afternoon, as the soup at that time was the most sweet-smelling!

Other Cooking Methods of Soup Noodle
In order to meet the modern and diverse eating habits, besides the traditional oil noodle, Soup Noodle shops also provide other noodles like rice and sweet potato noodle and rice noodle. If you order dry noodles, don't forget to add a bowl of barbeque sauce pig blood soup, which is the most traditional and authentic Taiwanese cuisine!