Destination
Ipoh
The story
Penang prawn mee (also called hae mee, or har mee in Hokkien) is Penang's most-ordered breakfast noodle soup: a broth of unbelievable depth, made from hours of simmering prawn shells and pork bones together, coloured a deep orange from the prawn oil, and topped with poached whole prawns, halves of hard-boiled egg, blanched water spinach (kang kong), crispy fried shallots and a spoon of chilli paste. Served with a mix of yellow egg noodles and rice vermicelli in the same bowl. Sold from stalls at every Penang morning hawker centre and kopitiam.
Method
Peel the prawns, keeping the heads and shells separately. Reserve the flesh for later. Rinse the heads and shells.
Warm the oil in a large heavy pot over medium-high heat. Add the prawn heads and shells. Fry for 5 to 6 minutes, pressing hard with a wooden spoon to release the oils and juices from the heads, until they turn deep orange-red.
Add the pork bones, onions, garlic, ginger and salt. Cover with the cold water. Bring to a simmer and cook 4 to 6 hours at a lazy bubble, skimming any foam every 30 minutes. Top up water if it drops too low.
Pass the broth through a fine sieve into a clean pot, pressing hard on the solids to extract every drop of stock. Discard the solids. You should have about 2.5 litres of deep orange, savoury broth.
In a small pan, warm the oil over medium heat. Add the chilli paste and belacan. Cook 3 to 4 minutes, stirring, until darkened. Add the palm sugar and salt. Stir until dissolved. Add half of this chilli oil to the strained broth (the rest is for garnish).
Bring the finished broth back to a gentle simmer. Poach the reserved prawn flesh in the broth for 90 seconds until pink and just cooked. Lift out and set aside.
Bring a separate pot of water to a boil. Cook the yellow egg noodles for 1 minute; drain. Do the same with the drained rice vermicelli (30 seconds only).
Divide the yellow noodles and rice vermicelli between 4 large deep bowls (a small handful of each per bowl). Add a small pile of blanched water spinach and bean sprouts on one side of each bowl.
Ladle over hot prawn broth generously. Top each bowl with 4 to 5 poached prawns, 2 halves of hard-boiled egg, a scatter of fried shallots and a spoon of the reserved chilli oil. Add sliced spring onion greens.
Serve immediately with lime wedges and extra chilli paste on the side.
Tips
- Roast the prawn shells hard. This is the whole flavour foundation. 5 to 6 minutes of pressing the shells against the hot pan releases the deep orange oil and umami that give Penang prawn mee its specific depth. Under-roasted shells give you a pale, thin broth.
- Simmer for hours. 4 to 6 hours minimum. Every Penang stall simmers its broth all day. The long cook is what develops the specific depth that distinguishes real Penang prawn mee from a home approximation.
- Pork bones with the prawn shells. Pork bones add body and mouthfeel that pure prawn stock lacks. The Penang hawker recipe is prawn + pork together, always.
- Blooming the chilli oil in the broth. Adding some sambal-chilli-belacan oil to the finished broth is what gives it its classic orange colour and mild spice. Adding it as garnish only (rather than to the broth) misses the point.
- Two noodles is the classic. Half yellow egg noodles + half rice vermicelli in the same bowl is the Penang standard. Using just one changes the eating experience.
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