House Recipes: Bang Sauce Prawns E-fu Noodles

There is no better culinary centrepiece for your Lunar New Year celebration this Sunday than Bang Sauce Prawns E-fu Noodles. Created by chefs Pong Chung and Roy Wong, the dish has a rich golden-coloured sauce, along with fragrant prawns (called ‘ha’ in Cantonese and used as a homophone for the sound of laughter), added to the e-fu noodles that symbolise longevity. 
 
Chefs Chung and Wong are both trained in Chinese cooking. Wong was previously the second-in-command in the dim sum section of the three-Michelin starred T’ang Court in The Langham Hong Kong, while Pong was the dim sum head chef. When they were creating the dishes for this year’s Lunar New Year menu, they wanted to draw on past experiences of classic festive dishes, but with their own twist to add creativity for some new and delicious flavours.
 
For these Bang Sauce Prawns E-fu Noodles, they took the popular Bang Sauce Prawns from the Soho House club menu and turned it into a noodle dish. The ‘Bang’ sauce itself has some Southeast Asian influence, using coconut milk as the base, and adding spicy XO sauce and fermented bean chilli paste for a sweet and spicy combination that’s reminiscent of a laksa-style sauce. 
 

Bang Sauce Prawns E-fu Noodles
 
Ingredients
80g E-fu noodles, cooked according to the packet instructions
3 fresh prawns, cleaned and peeled with tails left on
Thai basil leaves, deep fried for garnish

For the sauce
420ml coconut milk 70ml XO sauce
 35g fermented bean chilli paste
2 tsp sugar 
Salt to taste
Chicken powder to taste
 ½ tbsp flour
½ tbsp vegetable oil

Method
1. On a medium-low heat, add the coconut milk, XO sauce, fermented bean chilli paste, sugar, salt and chicken powder to a pan. Stir until combined, taking care not to burn the coconut milk. 

2. In a bowl, add one part flour to one part vegetable oil (half a tablespoon each) and stir until well combined. Add the mixture to the sauce and stir until it starts to thicken, then set aside.
 
3. Add a generous amount of oil to a clean pan on a medium-high heat and shallow fry the prawns until they start to turn orange. (If you do not want to shallow fry, simply sautee them with a few tablespoons of oil). Cook until the prawns become fragrant, then set aside. 
 
4. Add three tablespoons of the sauce to a pan on a medium heat and sautee the prawns so that they’re coated and cooked through. Set aside.
 
5. Heat up the rest of the sauce in a pan, then add the cooked noodles. Combine the noodles with the sauce, then serve with the prawns and garnish with Thai basil.