Easy Hand-Pulled Noodles

These freshly made hand-pulled noodles are springy and meaty, with a chewy mouthfeel that you’ll never get from dried noodles. Learn all the secrets of hand-pulled noodles so you can easily make them at home without fail! {Vegan}

Noodles are one of the most important elements of Chinese food culture. Handmade noodles might be a rarity, and even a pricey proposition outside of China. However, back in the old country, they are a cheap everyday comfort food. No matter whether it’s a hot bowl of noodles in a restaurant or freshly made noodles to cook at home, it is one of the cheapest ways to get a fast, fulfilling, and hearty one-dish meal. 

Why make noodles at home

Despite the low cost of noodles at restaurants, a lot of people still enjoy making them from scratch at home. The reason? Because:

1. It’s just so easy to make hand-pulled noodles once you’ve learned the trick.
2. Homemade noodles don’t contain any additives. Packaged fresh noodles usually have additives for a better mouthfeel and a longer shelf life. 
3. The freshly made noodles taste so good, much better than the packaged dried ones.

There are countless types of noodles in China and I will introduce you to the hand-pulled (拉面, la mian) variety. It might sound daunting to make this type of noodle at home, especially if you’ve ever watched a noodle dance in China. But the truth is, hand-pulled noodles are one of the easiest handmade noodles for a beginner to make.

Why hand-pulled noodles are the easiest homemade noodles and the one you should learn first

This leads me back to one of my fun cooking experiences several years ago. Back in 2011, I was still quite bad at cooking and didn’t cook as much as I do now. One day, my boyfriend (and now husband) and I decided to try to make hand shaved noodles (刀削面, dao xiao mian).

It’s a specialty from Shanxi province. To cook it, you need to make a block of very tough dough and use one hand to hold the dough and the other to use a special square-bladed knife to carve off thin pieces of dough directly into boiling water. Sometimes for the sake of performance, a chef will put the dough on his head and use both hands to slice noodles into the pot. It’s quite a scene, in a circus act kind of way.

Long story short, we didn’t manage to get the dough right and it was too soft to slice. Since we didn’t want to waste it and the noodle sauce was ready, we started to pull the dough by hand and made our first bowl of hand-pulled noodles at home.

You see what I did there? Even when you fail at making other types of noodles, you can still use the dough to make hand-pulled noodles, because they’re such a no-brainer!

Our approach

There are two different approaches to making hand-pulled noodles. In most professional kitchens, the most common way is to knead the dough for a very long time to develop the gluten, then let it rest for even longer so the dough is relaxed enough to pull.

However, we found that method not practical in the home kitchen since no one wants to knead the dough for an hour (it takes a similar amount of time, even with a KitchenAid mixer).

After many test runs, we found that the key to making hand-pulled noodle dough is to knead just enough to get the dough smooth without developing too much gluten. So you do not need to rest the dough for too long before pulling. Our method requires very little active kneading, and it will yield a soft and springy dough that’s very easy to work with.

How to make hand-pulled noodles 

(1) Prepare the dough – 1 short rest

To make the dough without developing too much gluten, you will need to rest the dough three times before pulling the noodles.

1. Slowly drizzle the salt water into the flour and mix at the same time.
2. Mix until the water is fully incorporated and the flour turns into shaggy threads. 
3. Start to knead the dough together.
4. If there’s still some dry flour left, drizzle in a bit more water until there’s no dry flour left.
5. Once you mix the flour and water, only knead the dough for 2 minutes until it forms a very rough ball. Do not overwork the dough.
6. Let the dough rest for 20 minutes before kneading it again, for just 1 to 2 minutes, until the dough becomes smooth.

(2) Shape the dough – 2nd resting

Roll out the dough depending on the type of noodles you want to make and let it rest for 2 hours to fully relax the gluten before pulling and cooking.

We’ve included three types of noodle doughs in this recipe, so you can choose the type you prefer:

• Thin noodles: great for noodle soup, fried noodles, or lo mein noodles
• Flat noodles: good for noodle soup or noodles served with a sauce
• Wide noodles: good with a super heavy sauce such as cumin lamb or da pan ji

NOTE: it’s important to oil the dough and cover it, to prevent them from sticking and drying out.

(3) Pull the noodles

• First, you need to cut the dough according to the width of the noodles you want to make.

PS: It’s important to keep the cut noodles covered with plastic wrap so they don’t dry out.

• The process of pulling the three types of noodles is the almost same – pull the dough into a thin strip with one motion, and keep pulling and bouncing on the table into a thin shape, then fold it, pull it, and bounce it again until it reaches the desired thickness (except for flat or wide noodles, which you don’t need to fold). 

• Once you’ve pulled the noodles, rest them on the working surface without overlapping. If you have a small working surface, you can dust the noodles with flour so they don’t stick together if placed too closely together.

(4) Cook the noodles

• To cook the noodles, drop a few strands of noodle into the boiling water at a time and cook until they’re cooked through and springy. If you prefer the texture to be softer, boil them a bit longer.
• Once done, remove the noodles to a colander and rinse them with tap water to stop the cooking.

(5) Serve and store

The freshly made noodles can be enjoyed with a simple sauce and made into various noodle dishes including soup and stir fries. 

Here are some ideas on how to use them:

• Cumin Lamb Noodles
• Vegetable Lo Mein
• Easy Soy Sauce Noodles
• Real Deal Sesame Noodles
• Dan Dan Noodles
• Da Pan Ji (Chicken Potato Stew with Noodles)
• Lanzhou Beef Noodles
• Biang Biang Noodles (Chinese Hot Sauce Noodles)

You can find detailed information in the recipe below on storage.

Frequently asked questions

Can I store the raw hand-pulled noodles?

Unfortunately, NO. It’s very important to cook the noodles immediately once you’ve pulled them. In fact, the pulled noodles should be dropped directly into boiling water (that’s how they do it at restaurants). If you want to store the raw noodles, you must use starch (or flour) to coat them so they won’t stick together. But the dough will change in texture during this process.

If you want to store raw noodles, check out my rolled noodles recipe.

Can I store the cooked noodles?

YES! This is the best way to store them. You can slightly undercook the noodles if you plan on storing them. So they reach the perfect consistency once they’re reheated. You can see more notes on how to reheat in the recipe below.

Can I store the noodle dough?

Yes. Once you roll out the dough and let it rest at room temperature for 2 hours, you can cover the dough and move it to the fridge. Cut, pull, and boil the noodles when you plan to serve them.

Do the noodles work in stir fries?

Yes! The thin type of noodles works perfectly in stir fries and as lo mein noodles. 

In this case, I recommend you slightly undercook the noodles, so they will achieve the perfect textures once stir fried.

What brand and kind of flour did you use? 

We tested with various brands and types of flour and finally achieved a consistent result no matter what brand we were using. 

In the pictures I used all-purpose flour from the King Author brand (11.7% protein content). 

We also tried a mixture of 370 g (3 cups) of cake flour and 30 g (3 tablespoons) of bread flour. This mixture produces a slightly smoother dough (marginally). It’s possible to use different blend to achieve different texture, even 100% bread flour, but I do not recommend using 100% cake flour.

Back in China I used a Chinese-brand all-purpose flour. It required slightly more water (a bit more than 1 cup).

I saw professional hand-pulled noodles use alkaline water. Why don’t you use it?

Using alkaline water in the noodle dough increases the chewiness of the texture and it doesn’t affect the pulling process. (It is the salt that makes the dough stretchy.) I found that even if you skip the alkaline water, you will produce a great result with a chewy texture (without the noodles getting too tough). So I decided to skip this ingredient, which makes the recipes a bit more complicated.

Is it possible to pull several noodles simultaneously?

Yes, but you might need a bit of practice. If you decide to pull more than one noodle at a time, coat the dough with flour before pulling so the noodle strands don’t stick together.

Can I rest the dough for longer?

Yes. It won’t affect the result much. Especially the 2nd resting. Once the dough is relaxed, it stays relaxed if you store it for hours before pulling.

Recipe update notes 

I created this recipe back in 2015 while I was still living in China. It’s a family recipe and I created a short video to show the process.

Over the years I’ve received many readers’ positive feedback and questions. Moreover, I have since moved to the US and realized that all-purpose flour here is different from the ones in China (namely, they have more protein content). The old recipe still works but sometimes it does not produce consistent results depending on the brand of flour you use. 

That’s why we decided to retest the recipe using various types of flour in the US, slightly refining the process to make the result more consistent and closer to perfect each time.

We also added instructions on making different shapes of noodles according to your suggestions.

You can still find the old recipe attached at the end of this post.

I haven’t managed to update the video yet, so you will find the old video using my previous recipe (the pulling is different). I will try to create a new video soon. Stay tuned!

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If you give this recipe a try, let us know! Leave a comment, rate it (once you’ve tried it), and take a picture and tag it @omnivorescookbook on Instagram! I’d love to see what you come up with.

Lilja Walter is a part of the Omnivore’s Cookbook team and worked closely with Maggie to develop and test this recipe.

The old recipe (before update)

Ingredients

• 420 grams (3 cups) all-purpose flour and extra to dust the working surface
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup and 3 tablespoons (285-ml) water (room temperature)

Instructions

To prepare the dough

1. Combine flour and salt in a large bowl and mix well. Slowly blend in water and mix with a pair of chopsticks, until water is integrated with the flour and there is no dry flour left. Dust both hands with dry flour, then start to knead by hand until dough forms. The dough should be quite soft and sticky.
2. Dust a working surface with dry flour. Transfer the dough onto it and continue to knead until the surface turns smooth and the texture springy, 10 to 15 minutes. Dust hands and the working surface with extra flour whenever the dough starts to feel sticky during the process.
3. Dust a large bowl with dry flour. Transfer the dough to that bowl and cover the dough with a damp dish towel. Cover the bowl with a lid (or plastic wrap). Let the dough rest at room temperature for at least 2 hours (or store the dough in the fridge if you’re planning to use it the next day, after resting at room temperature).
4. Dust the working surface and both hands with flour. Transfer the dough onto the working surface and knead it a few times. Divide the dough into 2 equal pieces, then again to make 4 pieces total. Knead each piece of dough by hand to shape a ball.
5. Dust the working surface again. Take one piece of dough and press it into a round disc. Roll it with a rolling pin into a long and round sheet, about 5 to 6 millimeters (0.2 inches) thick. Roll out the rest of the dough pieces the same way. Use large bowls or plastic wrap to cover and seal the dough sheets, to keep them from drying out. Let rest for another 30 minutes to 1 hour.

To pull and cook the noodles

1. Right before making noodles, bring a medium sized pot of water to a roaring boil (very important).
2. Work on the dough sheets one by one. You should cover the rest of the dough with a damp dish towel or plastic wrap.
3. Slice the dough sheet into several strips, about 2 centimeters (0.8 inches) wide (or narrower if you want thinner noodles).
4. Pick up a strip of dough and start to pull it from one end to shape an evenly thick, long noodle, until it becomes quite thin and almost breaks apart. It’s OK if the noodle breaks into 2 to 3 shorter segments. Drop the noodles immediately into the boiling water. (To get the idea of the process, please refer to this short video.)
5. Pull another 2 to 3 strips of dough and drop them into the boiling water. Cover the rest of the dough with a damp dish towel (see footnote). Boil the noodles until cooked through, 1 to 2 minutes. Transfer to a plate and set aside. Work on the rest of the dough in the same manner.

To serve and store

1. You can use the noodles in any noodle soup or mix them with sauce. If you aren’t going to serve the noodles immediately, add a few drops of sesame oil onto them and mix by hand. You should always eat the noodles while they’re warm and fresh, because they will become sticky and turn into a solid mass once they cool off.
2. Store leftover noodles in an airtight container in the fridge for 1 to 2 days.
3. To serve leftover noodles, place them in a colander so that you can easily dip them into a pot of boiling water. When you do this, use a pair of chopsticks to gently separate the noodles, and leave them in the water until warm. Heating them this way shouldn’t take more than 30 seconds.
   

NOTES
The noodles are very easy to cook through, so I suggest you cook them in small batches, until you’re familiar with the process. You should always cover the unused dough with a damp dish towel or plastic wrap, because it will dry out very fast.