For Seafood and Basketballs

Hello everybody!  You are probably wondering what on earth I am talking about in the title.  Well, let me tell you a little story.  A few years ago, quite a few years ago really…I went to Benihana with a couple of friends.  You all are familiar with Benihana, right?  The Japanese food restaurant where they cook the food right in front of you?  Yep, that place.  Normally, you would expect a Japanese cook, or at least an Asian one.  Not that day.  We had a very nice…..big white dude.  He was, apparently, of Eastern European descent. 

*Little disclaimer:  I am not making fun of this man.  Yes, he had a thick accent, but I am not being mean about it.  I rather enjoyed it.  In fact, I wish I had an accent!  I feel I would be a much more interesting person.  Please feel free to read my blogs in the accent of your choice.*

So anyway, sometimes we had a hard time understanding him with his super thick accent.  Especially when he was talking about the “Yinger Sauce”.  We figured out he meant “ginger sauce”, but when he said the yinger sauce was for “seafood and basketballs” we were stumped.  I questioned it.  He laughed and said “No, basketballs!”  We went back and forth, until my genius friend said “Aha! Vegetables!”  From them on, the yinger sauce was always for ……seafood and basketballs.

So in case you haven’t noticed….from here on out, “ginger” sauce will be known as “yinger” sauce.

So last week, I was craving Benihana.  We don’t have one in Reno, so I made my own Hibachi chicken and shrimp…..and yinger sauce.  I found a recipe for the yinger sauce online, but I tweaked it to make it my own.  Not to toot my own horn, but I think I made it better.  Toot toot!  I will show you how to make my version of yinger sauce, and how to make a yummy recipe for sesame noodles with the sauce.

This sauce is made from things you might already have in your pantry.  I used 2 shallots, soy sauce, white vinegar, rice vinegar, lemon juice and ginger from a squeezy tube.  You can totally use fresh ginger.  This goes in the food processor, so the processor will mince it up.  I had this tube in my fridge….so that is what I used. 

You can see by my “Great Value” labels that I really busted out the good stuff for this;)

Like I said, it all goes in the processor or blender.  I did give the shallots a rough chop first.

You will get about a cup and a quarter of sauce.  This sauce is good with beef, chicken, pork, seafood, and vegetables.  And vegetables!  I like to just eat it with a spoon too!

We had eaten the sauce with a couple of meals, and I still had about ½ cup left.  While it will keep in the fridge for a couple of weeks, I wanted to use mine up.  My kids LOVE sesame noodles, so I decided to see what this sauce could add to my usual sesame noodle recipe.

For my noodles, I used vermicelli, garlic, broccoli slaw, mushrooms, more soy sauce, chili oil, vegetable oil, sesame seeds and yinger sauce.  And oh yeah, green onion.

You can use any vegetables you want.  This recipe is really just to show you how to make the “sauce” that goes over the noodles.  I chose these because I already had them on hand.  Plus, they are 2 of the very few veggies that I will eat.  And it is all about me, people.

I sautéed my veggies over very high heat…in a bit of oil.  Basically, I stir fried them.

My sauce or “dressing” for the noodles started with 2 cloves of garlic that I minced.

Then, I added my yinger sauce, more soy, some chili oil, and enough vegetable oil to emulsify it.  That means to “bring it together”.  You will have almost 1 and ¼ cups dressing.

I cooked my noodles according to the package directions and stirred the cooked veggies in.  Then, I added my dressing.  Now this is one of those noodle recipes that is good warm, room temp and cold.  I prefer the noodles cold, but everyone is different. 

I served mine with some thinly sliced grilled steak on top.  Don’t forget to sprinkle the noodles with sesame seeds and green onions!

These noodles turned out really good!  Addy has an obsession with the sesame noodles at Draeger’s….and she said these were better.  She even took some in her lunch to school…..which says a lot because normally anything that isn’t a turkey sandwich embarrasses her;)

I hope you try this recipe for yinger sauce.  Like I said, it is great with meat, veggies and seafood….just as a dipping sauce.  And if you make the sauce, you might as well make the noodles!!

See you next week!

BTW-here is Peepers with her missing tooth.  And her sister;)

CutiesJ

Ginger “Yinger” Sauce

2 shallots, roughly chopped

2 tablespoons ginger

¼ cup lemon juice

¼ cup white vinegar

¼ cup rice vinegar

1 cup soy sauce

Blend all ingredients in a food processor until smooth

Sesame Yinger Noodles

2 pounds vermicelli, cooked

12 ounce package broccoli slaw, stir-fried with mushrooms

1 cup mushrooms, chopped and stir-fried with slaw

2 cloves garlic, minced

½ cup yinger sauce

½ cup soy sauce

3 tablespoons chili oil

¼ cup vegetable oil

Green onions and sesame seeds for garnish

For dressing:  Combine garlic, yinger sauce, soy, chili oil and veg oil.  Whisk until blended.  Pour over noodles and veggies.  Garnish with green onion and sesame seeds.  Serve warm or cold.