Jamie and Jimmy's Friday Night Feast
By Jamie Oliver
Liv Tyler's vegetable balls
Gnarly noodles, carrot, ginger & Chinese five-spice
40 mins
Not Too Tricky
serves 6
About the recipe
Liv’s family love to share dim sum. With the help of the lovely Ning Ma from Mamalan, Brixton Village – a bustling street food restaurant inspired by her family’s dumpling and noodle stall at the heart of a Beijing market – we’re teaching Liv the secret to best-ever vegetable balls.
Recipe From
Ingredients
50g fine dried vermicelli noodles
300g carrots
6 spring onions
5cm piece of ginger
1 big bunch of fresh coriander (60g)
¼ teaspoon Chinese five-spice
¼ teaspoon ground white pepper
200g self-raising flour
vegetable oil, for frying
sweet chilli sauce
Top Tip
TIP: Don’t be too perfect or precise when forming the veggie balls – this will give you that fantastic gnarly, crunchy texture.
Method
- Cook the noodles according to the packet instructions, then drain and roughly chop.
- Trim and coarsely grate the carrot, then trim and finely slice the spring onions, and add to a bowl.
- Peel and finely chop the ginger, and finely chop the coriander (stalks and all), then add to the bowl with the drained noodles. Mix together gently.
- Add a good pinch of sea salt, the five-spice, white pepper and flour, and gently fold together, adding 150ml of water, continuing to gently fold and mix together – don’t overmix, or the balls will become dense.
- Half-fill a large sturdy pan with oil and gently bring up to 190ºC (or use a deep fryer).
- Working in batches, carefully drop small balls (around 1 level tablespoon each) of the mixture into the hot oil – don’t worry about them being perfectly shaped.
- Cook for 4 to 5 minutes, or until golden and crisp, then drain on kitchen paper, separating with wooden chopsticks if they start to stick together. Keep warm in a low oven while you cook the remaining batches, if needed.
- Serve with sweet chilli sauce for dipping. Delicious served alongside Prawn dumplings as part of a dim sum selection.
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