Lunch to go

Everybody as a child has a comfort food and one of mine as a child was spaghetti noodles with soy sauce and little sesame oil. Salty and delicious with that little hint of flavor from the sesame oil. Lately I've been realizing how that's not exactly the healthiest thing in the world to eat so I've been trying to reinvent it. So what I've come up with is the following recipe, which is actually what I make for lunch quite often as it travels well and it just as good cold as it is hot. The funny thing though is that soba noodles are a recent discovery for me, as I had never even heard of them until I moved to SF. After all little Chinese girls living in Virginia don't really eat Japanese food and the ethnic markets I went to were mostly geared towards Chinese immigrants such as myself.

In case you were wondering soba noodles are a thin buckwheat noodles that are used often in Japanese cooking. You can serve them with dipping sauces or as a part of a soup. They're equally good cold as they are hot and have a bit of a nutty taste to them. Very versatile.

So today I actually made this for my own lunch and for a good friend of mine. We were supposed to have lunch together, but he couldn't stay as he had errands to run. Instead I packed up his lunch brought it out to the car and sent him on his way.

Soba Noodle Lunch:
8 oz. soba noodles
1/2 cup of scallions chopped
1 cup of shitake mushrooms sliced
2 1/2 cups of snow peas
1/2 cup of soy sauce
3 tablespoons of rice wine vinegar
2 tablespoons of sesame oil
3 tablespoons of sesame seeds
2 tablespoons of canola oil

1) Cook the soba noodles in boiling water
2) In a wok heat the oil to med-high heat. When the oil is hot add in the snow peas and stir-fry for 3-5 minutes.
3) While the snow peas are in the pot stir together the vinegar, sesame oil, sesame seeds and soy sauce for the dressing.
4) After the snow peas are starting to cook up a bit stir in the scallions and shitakes. Keep on stir frying until the snow peas are starting to wilt just a tiny bit. They should still be very crispy.
5) Drain the noodles and stir in the dressing along with the veggies.