Ipoh Sar Hor Fun

Ipoh, the capital city of the State of Perak in Malaysia, is famous for this dish. The best, thinly sliced 'hor fun', which is 'rice noodle', can be found in Ipoh and it is so, cos of the water found there is good for making good rice noodles . In the good old days, when there were no highways and byways, it takes forever to reach Ipoh but now, it takes less than 3 hours, not that long to drive there and have a bowl of this noodles. Ipoh has many more good eats so it is worth the drive.

Ingredients:

1 lb fresh rice noodle/dried Hu Tieu

1 lb shrimps with head - on

2 nos. whole chicken leg

Chinese chives (sectioned)
2 stalks scallions (chopped)

Ingredients for Chicken Broth:

3 nos. whole chicken carcass/2 packets of Swanson Chicken stock
Shrimp's shell (removed from the above 1 lb shrimps)
1/2 lb soya bean sprouts (tai tau nga)
2 x 1 inch size rock sugar
1 tsp whole white peppercorns (crushed)
5 liters water
salt to taste

Ingredients for Shrimp Oil:
125ml cooking oil
Shrimp head (removed from the above 1 lb shrimps)

Method:

To cook the shrimps, bring 1 liter of water to the boil and blanched the shrimps until they turn pink and cooked through. Remove and shock in ice water. Remove the heads and drain dry, to be use for frying with the oil. Remove the shells for making the chicken broth.

To cook the chicken legs, bring back the above water which was used to cook the shrimp, to a rolling boil. Put in the chicken legs and when water comes back to a boil, let it simmer for 5 minutes and cover with lid, turn off heat and let chicken legs poach for 15 minutes. Remove and shred when cooled.

To make chicken broth, rinse the chicken carcass,place them into a stock pot, add in the rest of stock ingredients, together with the water which was used for cooking the shrimp and chicken legs, bring to the boil. Reduce to low heat and cook for approximately 1-2 hours. Alternatively, use the pressure cooker which will take less than 1/2 the time.

Season with salt and strain the stock. Leave aside.

To make shrimp oil, heat up the cooking oil in the preheated wok, place in shrimp heads, stir-fry over low heat until the shrimp oil separates. Remove from heat, strain well.

Pour some of the prawn's oil into the chicken stock.

Blanch the "Hor Fun", Chinese chives in boiling water separately. Dish up and drained.

To assemble, place the "Hor Fun" into a serving bowl, add in blanched Chinese chives, , chicken shreds and shrimps.

Serve with hot chicken broth, add in a little shrimp oil and chopped scallions.

Serve hot with fried sambal or chopped chilly in soya sauce.

Serves