The Tastiest Lobster Yee Mein 龍蝦伊麵! | For the Year of the Dragon

Chinese New Year, Year of the Dragon, this is the dish, gotta cook it, let's go. Alright people, we're going to make lobster yimian. So what is yimian first of all? Well, yimian is a type of noodle, a type of ifu noodles or longevity noodles. And we have a recipe for that, a separate recipe for that. We cook it all the time for banquets or for special occasions like birthdays because longevity symbolizes long life. Today, we're going to combine that with ginger scallion lobster, longxia or longxia, which literally means dragon shrimp. So what better dish to celebrate the Year of the Dragon for Chinese New Year than lobster yimian. So you get flavors of the base of a nice ifu noodles or longevity noodles cooked with scallion and a nice sauce flavored with lobster from your ginger scallion lobster. So you get a little bit of flavor from the lobster, you get a tender piece of lobster, but then you also get that ifu noodle that has that wonderful nice texture to it and ginger scallion flavor and lobster, just a great combination of flavors. And that's what we're going to have to celebrate Chinese New Year. Let's get to it. I'm going to explain what the components are here first. So we've got yimian, which is an ifu noodle, it's a little cake here. Sometimes it comes in the box, sometimes it comes in just a little wrapped package. We've got scallion and I put a little bit of garlic. We're going to cook the noodles separately, put them on a bed, on a plate, flavored noodles. We're going to cook our ginger scallion lobster and the way we cook this is going to be slightly different. We're going to use a little bit more sauce. Then we're going to stir fry the noodles, flavor them, use that lobster oil to flavor the noodles, which is going to be tremendous. Put them on a plate and then we're going to cook the ginger scallion lobster. Make it a little bit saucier than usual because usually it's dry and put it on top. Now we could put it all together. If you do that, you risk overcooking the lobster and we don't want that. Then you get flavored noodles, you get the ginger scallion lobster that's cooked perfectly and that's it. It's really good. It's going to be great, guys. Let's make it. Off to the wok. All right, we've got three quarts of water boiling. We're going to cook the ifu noodles. Put them right in there. Basically, after you put them in there, you want to turn it over. What you want to do is you want to fluff this out, mix it up good so that everything cooks evenly. Once these noodles are cooked through, al dente, that's when you want to take them out and give them a quick rinse. I'm kind of moving it constantly so they cook evenly. I'm going to try one of these at the top. I taste it and I still taste the dry core. It still has to cook. It's been about a minute and a half, two minutes, which is normal. These usually cook about three minutes. This is why the ifu noodles and these yi min is so good because they're kind of spongy and they have a nice texture. I can see it's a little bit uncooked. Needs another 30 seconds. I'm going to turn off the flame and call these done because they're going to continue cooking. Oh, yes, this is why I call them long life noodles. And you know what? If you've got a pasta claw, it works just as good as these chopsticks. Quick rinse in the sink. Stop the cooking so they don't stick together. Still a little hot. Cool to the touch now. OK, they're just warm right now. Put them into the colander. All right. Got about a cup and a half, two cups of oil in there. And we're going to dredge these lobster pieces. When you dredge these lobster pieces, it's the most important to dredge these to cover the meat, to protect the meat. Keeping the moisture, see that? Just like that. Just got to coat the meat. That's the most important thing is coating the meat. I mean, basically, if you, you know, the coating of the shell, if the shell gets coated, it's by mistake. You don't really need it. All right. You want to make sure your oil is nice and hot. And if you're using a smaller wok, you might think about using less oil so it doesn't splash. The nice thing about the wok is that the rim is high and, you know, you won't get, you won't make a mess. So in they go. One at a time. Do this in batches. And you can see here the importance of a strong vent. Yep, they are ready. And here's where the spider really shines. They're about 80% done. We'll do the next batch. Flash fry, see that? You can see the oil has cooled off already. And that is probably good also. That's why we call this a flash fry, because you can see it is a quick process. And we put it on this sheet pan and continue. Woo-hoo! You basically just want to get it to the point where the shells turn color. And you can see the meat is still a little bit translucent, which means that it's not quite done yet. But that's the way you want it. You don't want to overcook it, because we're going to cook this again. Okay, we'll cook these shells. You might ask, like, why would you want to cook these shells? Well, first of all, you do have to cook them. Second of all, basically we're flavoring the oil. And these shells you want to cook pretty thoroughly, because we're just going to use these. Get them a nice bright red, a good color. I turn the flame back on briefly, and I'm turning it off again. You have to be careful. These lobsters are wet, and they will splatter. All right, flame is off. Put these back in. And now what we're going to do is strain it into a small pot. Strain this oil with a fine-mesh strainer. And this is umami oil. It's lobster oil. Lobster-flavored oil. And then, boy, if you use this lobster oil to cook fried rice, to cook your favorite dish, and this oil, full of flavor. I'm going to put about a tablespoon, probably two tablespoons. That's about two tablespoons or so. This is basically lobster flavor. I'm going to start out at medium-high heat. Put the whites of the scallions in. Let those cook for a little while. A few seconds is a little while. And then I'm going to turn it up high. I'm going to put these noodles in. High heat. Let this go. But now we're going to add the sauce. Flame is on high. Okay. These look nice and moist. Ready to go. And you don't want sticky noodles. Noodles, if they look a little bit dry, add a little bit of water. Because it's okay. You definitely want the noodles to be slippery. You don't want them to be sticky. Okay. That's it. I'm going to turn the flame off and plate it. Now we're ready for the lobster. I'm going to take the oil. Lobster oil. Turn on kind of low heat right now. Because what I want to do is I want to infuse the ginger and the scallion whites. There's three scallions in here. And I'm going to turn it up a little bit. And while that's heating, I'm going to put our two shells on here. Just like that. Tucked right in. And then, now, put the lobster in. Now I'm going to put these legs in here too. I didn't put the legs in here into the oil because the legs tend to explode. And then the meat comes shooting out of there, so you don't want that. So these legs will cook pretty fast. I've got it on high heat right now. I'm going to bake this lobster. I'm going to have this cover ready. Shaoxing wine. And the cover goes on. One minute. Probably turn the heat down a little bit. I don't want to scorch it. In the meantime, I'll stir up this sauce, which is the sauce for the ginger scallion lobster. And now it's baking all those flavors. The ginger, the scallion, the lobster, all baking in there. And those little legs are cooking. So it's been about one minute. Now, on a home walk where you have a lower flame, you might want to put it a little bit longer. But this, I know my walk. It's about done. So now I'm uncovering it. I've turned it to high heat. I'm going to stir in the sauce. Just like that. Toss all those scallions in there. Everything looks cooked. Wonderful. And we're ready to plate. I'm going to turn the flame off. So now I'm just going to plate this carefully on here. I think we're going to take the chopstick. Take this lobster. Oh, look at this. And we've got more of this stuff. We'll put this on the backside. Wow, is this dish festive or what? That's a lot of lobster. We'll lift those noodles out because we'll kind of like mix and lift the noodles out for presentation. Put it on here. You want to zhuzh the noodles? Got the food stylist over here. Yeah. And then put the scallions over it. That's perfect. There it is. That is the Year of the Dragon lobster yi min noodles. And lobster is long xia or long ha, which means dragon shrimp. Chinese New Year. Year of the Dragon. This is the dish. Got to cook it. Let's go. All right. Got to get some noodles. I'm looking for scallions. You're looking for scallions? I'm going to get a little claw here. Scallions, ginger. So I'm going to try the noodles first. Mmm. So much flavor. So different because of the lobster oil and the lobster. Mmm. The noodle alone tastes a lot of. Huge flavor. Mmm. Wonderful. Wow. I mean, every time I eat this dish. It's a very special dish. It's so good. Perfect for New Year. Perfect celebratory. I love this lobster head, but I'm not going to eat this on camera. These. This is the prize. Now, if I had a little lobster fork, I could eat it properly, but this pops right out. Mmm. It's tender lobster. You know what the best part is? We got this in summer lobster sale. $7.99 a pound. Woo-hoo. Except in the wintertime, it's a price we need to pay. I know. Mmm. So good. Here you go. I'll dish one out for you. Look at the noodle. The long life noodle. Get a nice doublet here. Oh, yeah. There you go. Mmm. Eating while operating the camera. That's a newfound skill. Oh, so good. So good. This yimin actually tastes a little bit like ramen, because ramen, I feel, I'm pretty sure, is a little bit like the packaged ramen. The dry ramen is also kind of fried, and it's an alkaline noodle, right? So if you can't find the yimin, maybe ramen's not a bad choice. Option, yeah. Option. I love the scallion. Ginger scallion. Exactly. Ginger scallion. We put four scallions in here, but if we put another two scallions, it wouldn't be too much. It's never too much. And if you like to kick it up, you could. In the regular yimin, we use Chinese chives. Put Chinese chives in here. You could put dried mushrooms or donggu, winter mushrooms. You could put that in there, too. Oh, sure. Very good. Don't you feel like you're at a banquet? I'm just looking at this. It's so special. It's a very special dish. And I think it's, you know what? And it's like a wow factor. There's a huge wow factor here. Oh, yeah. When you bring this to the table. Taste-wise, presentation-wise, color-wise, everything. It's a big deal. Be proud to serve this on the table during Chinese New Year. Sure. Have another piece. Are we doing this for Chinese New Year? Sure. Happy Year of the Dragon, everyone. Best health, best everything. Long life with lobster yimin noodles. Enjoy. Okay. Lobster yimin. Chinese New Year. Phonetics. Sounds like lobster. Year of the Dragon. Action. So what better dish to celebrate the Chinese New Year than lobster scallion... You are so strong. What better dish... To the wall!