Vietnamese chicken noodle salad

Taken from Bill Granger’s Everyday cookbook and presented in homage to spring which appears to have arrived in London.

Ingredients, serves 2

For the spicy chicken

• Two large chicken breasts, skinned and sliced into thin strips
• 3 tbsp fish sauce
• freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 3 garlic cloves, peeled, crushed
• 2 large red chillies, finely chopped
• 2 tsp sugar
• 2 tbsp sesame oil

For the salad

• 3 tbsp lime juice
• 1 tbsp light soy sauce
• 3 tbsp caster sugar
• 200g fresh vermicelli rice noodles- these can be found in the refrigerated veg stir fry section in the supermarkets. They’re very fine, white and come in bags. You could use dried but they’re not as nice in this recipe.
• 1 cucumber, thinly sliced into match sticks
• small handful or bag of fresh mint leaves roughly chopped
• 4 spring onions, sliced finely
• 2 tbsp cashews, crushed

Method

1. For the spicy chicken, whisk the fish sauce, pepper, garlic, chillies and sugar together in a small bowl.
2. In a separate bowl, pour half the marinade over the chicken pieces and mix well (you can leave this to rest for 20mins or so at this point if you like). Reserve the rest of the marinade.
3. Meanwhile, get a heavy bottomed frying pan heating up, boil the kettle and place your noodles into a sieve over the sink or a large bowl. Once the kettle has boiled, pour the hot water over the noodles to refresh them, then leave them to drain for 10 mins.
4. Now the frying pan is hot add the chicken. You want it to cook through and gain a nice honeyed glaze as the sugar caramelises. Keep an eye on it and turn the pieces occasionally. It will probably take about 10mins (I suggest you open the window- this can get smoky!) . Once cooked, remove the chicken from the pan and set aside to rest.
5. For the salad, make a dressing by adding the lime juice, soy and sugar to the reserved marinade, stirring until the sugar has dissolved.
6. Mix the drained noodles in a large bowl with the cucumber, mint, spring onions, cashews and the dressing until well combined.
7. To serve, divide the salad among four plates, and top with the chicken.