Pancit

Pancit is a traditional Filipino noodle dish. As with most nationally loved dishes, there are a thousand and one different ways to make it. Growing up, my best friend's mom was Fillipina and would make pancit on special occasions. Vermicelli rice noodles, pork, cabbage, carrots, and this amazingly spiced sausage that really brought everything together. Honestly, eating pancit with their family is one of my fondest food-related memories.

So, of course, years later I tried to reverse engineer this delicious meal. I researched online and pieced together different parts of different versions of pancit, but I knew the key to success was in that mysterious sausage. One day, I stumbled on it at the Asian supermarket. I recognized it immediately, and couldn't wait to take it home to finally try my hand at pancit myself. The final result is pretty genuine, and I am so pleased to have this scrumptious, noodle-based comfort food whenever the mood arises.

Pancit
Author: Amanda, adapted from Maria
Difficulty: easy
Serves: 4-6

Ingredients

• 1 medium pork loin
• 6 lengths Chinese sausage
• 1 large yellow onion, sliced into thin half moons
• 3-4 medium carrots, cut into matchsticks
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 6 cups shredded green cabbage
• 125g dry vermicelli noodles
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 6+ tablespoons soy sauce, to taste

Directions
Bring a kettle of water to a boil, and pour over dry vermicelli into an adequately sized pot or mixing bowl. Allow to sit for several minutes, then drain and set aside. Prepare the meats by slicing the pork into half medallions and the slice the sausage lengths diagonally. In a wok or large pot, heat up the vegetable oil and add the pork half-medallions, turning occasionally to ensure even cooking. Once pork is approximately half cooked, add the sausage to the pot. Continue to saute at medium heat until pork almost cooked and sausage is softened. Add onion, garlic, carrots, and cabbage. Saute until onions translucent and cabbage is wilting. Add the drained vermicelli noodles and soy sauce to taste. Combine well and serve.

Step-by-Step Photos

For stir-fry type dishes, your best bet is to do all of your prep work before starting to actually cook anything. Get all of your meat and vegetables ready so that nothing is compromised once you start bringing it all together. Slice the onions into half moons, mince the garlic, matchstick carrots, and chop or shred approximately 6 cups of cabbage. Slice the pork width-wise along the loin, and then cut those pieces in half again so they are not discs and are more suited to the size of the other aspects of the dish.

This is the Chinese sausage, the true star of the show. I found that half a package works perfectly, which is about 6 lengths of sausage. Unfortunately, I had used half previously and simply froze the rest of the sausage until I was ready to use it, so I don't have a picture of the package to show you. I was able to find it unrefrigerated in the Asian supermarket.

You'll also need vermicelli noodles. I used half of this package.

Prepare the vermicelli by bringing a kettle of water to a boil. Pour the water over the noodles in a heat-resistant receptacle. The noodles are delicate enough that simply sitting in the hot water should cook them sufficiently.

After a few minutes, they should look pretty soft. Drain them and set them aside until you are ready to use them with the rest of the dish.

Heat up a couple tablespoons of vegetable oil in a large wok (in this case I used a Dutch oven since my wok needs replacing). Add the pork pieces and stir them around so they cook evenly on all sides.

Once the pork appears to be about half way cooked and still pink in the middle, add the sausage.

After a few minutes of sauteing, the sausage should start to soften. Add the vegetables to the wok/pot and continue to saute, stirring frequently.

Add the cabbage and stir well to combine.

I ended up putting the lid on my Dutch oven, and the steam helped wilt the cabbage a little faster, but still stir it every couple of minutes to make sure that nothing burns to the bottom.

After a couple of minutes, the cabbage should start to wilt down. I prefer mine to have a bit of crunch in it still, but if you prefer a softer cabbage, you will want to let it saute a little bit longer.

Add the vermicelli noodles and soy sauce.

Stir well to combine the noodles with the rest of the dish and to avoid "noodle clumps."

Serve with extra soy sauce to taste.