How to make Mie Rica Rica, noodles topped with an addictively spicy, oily, chicken topping.
Mie Rica Rica is a bowl of springy wheat noodles slathered in a hot oily fragrant, chicken topping. This is a lesser known Indonesian noodle dish in other parts of the world, which is such a shame! This Indonesian street is typically made from pork, but this recipe uses chicken.
I discovered Mie Rica Rica at a recent hole-in-the-wall eatery specialising in authentic Indonesian street food in Singapore. When ordering, you get to choose the level of spiciness ranging from 0 to 5 for the extremely brave. Besides being super fun to say, the Mie Rica Rica was addictively good! I think about it all the time – too bad it’s not served at more places! Imagine how excited I got to lock down this recipe.
Key Ingredients for Mie Rica Rica
Rica-rica (or rica) refers to that mixture of spices used as a base of the dish. The ingredients are mashed together in a pestle and mortar – or blended in a food processor.
The base ingredients are easy to find:
- Red Chillies
- Thai Bird’s Eye Chillies
- Shallots
- Garlic
- Ginger
That’s it! The ginger is optional, I like to add it since a bit of ginger goes great with chicken.
Additional ingredients
Lemongrass and Kaffir Lime Leaves (or makrut lime leaves) are ingredients that add fragrance to the dish. Add these whole instead of blended with the base paste so that you can easily fish them out before scooping the Rica sauce on the noodles.
Bruise the lemongrass and lime leaves before adding it to the dish. Simply tear the lime leaves before adding, and hit the lemongrass with the back of the knife before adding. See my post on “how to prepare lemongrass for cooking” for more details on this.
What Noodles to Use for Mie Rica
In Indonesia, bakmie noodles are used. These are springy wheat noodles. Some variations have a slight curl to it. Actual freshly-made bakmie noodles are not that easily found in Singapore, but I used ‘you mian’ or ‘ban mian’ noodles. Same thing. You can find these freshly made in the noodle section, or the dry version too.
What Chicken to Use for Mie Rica
I used minced chicken here for convenience. If you want it extra delicious however, purchase boneless chicken thighs and mince that! If you have a good food processor you can chop it in chunks and let the food processor do the work. The extra fattiness is delicious!
Can I make this Vegan? Yes! Crumble firm tofu (extra firm tofu, if that’s available) into small chunks to replace the minced chicken.
Oily vs Creamy Version of Mie Rica
I made Ayam Rica Rica, and that was a dish best served with rice. This is a noodle version, and it differs slightly from the dish version. The first time I attempted this, I followed my Ayam Rica sauce recipe, which produced a more creamy, tomato sauce. While I liked it enough – I got major spicy pasta vibes – it didn’t quite replicate the Mie Rica that I had ordered. The Mie Rica I had was oilier, every strand of the noodle had a thin coating of fiery red spicy oil. The chilli pieces were also visible, not quite the blended cream consistency.
So I upped the oil levels, and used a food processor instead of a blender the second time round. That did the trick!
Spice Levels and Chilli Types
I used five red chillies and five bird’s eye chillies.
The red chillies are a medium-hot variety, and has a sweetness to it. It also adds colour to the sauce. The bird’s eye chillies are the main spice bombs in this. Add according to how much spice you can take.
I’m a lot more tame, so I stuck to my standard 5:5 ratio… with a few pops of cherry tomatoes. The tomatoes really help to temper the heat, while adding gorgeous colour. Careful that you don’t add too much in though – you don’t really want to be able to taste tomatoes in this.
What if I REALLY don’t want heat 🙁 If you really can’t take much heat, then use red capsicums or bell peppers which are sweet and very mild. Sometimes I would use the capsicums in place of red chillies.
If you want to stay true to spicy Mie Rica, don’t include tomatoes at all! Let that tongue burn.
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How to Make Mie Rica
- Finely chop or mince the chicken.
- Finely chop or mince the spices for the rica rica sauce.
- In a pan, heat the oil. Over low heat, saute the rica rica sauce.
- Saute for 2-3 minutes, before adding bruised lemongrass and torn kaffir lime leaves.
- Saute until fragrant, and the oil takes on a reddish hue.
- Add chicken and when chicken is not pink, season with sugar, light soy sauce, dark soy sauce and crumble in stock cube.
- Stir through and let chicken finish cooking.
- Blanch noodles and leafy vegetables.
- Add in 2-3 tbsps of oil from the rica rica sauce to a bowl.
- Slide in blanched noodles, and toss through.
- Top with chicken, and blanched vegetables.
- Garnish with fried onions and squeeze of lime.
Mie Rica Rica | Indonesian Spicy Chicken Oil Noodles
2
servings15
minutes20
minutesIngredients
200g or 2 servings of Bakmie Noodles/You Mian/Wheat Noodles
300g Chicken, minced
3/4 cup of Vegetable Oil (or any neutral tasting oil)
2 Lemongrass stalks, bruised
4-5 Kaffir Lime Leaves
1 tsp Brown Sugar (or regular white sugar)
1 tsp Light Soy Sauce
1 tsp Dark Sweet Soy Sauce or Kicap Manis
Optional: 1 Chicken Stock Cube (or Salt to taste)
- Blend or Mash Rica Rica Sauce Base
5 Red Chillies
5 Thai Bird’s Eye Chillies
3 Cherry Tomatoes (optional)
1 medium onions or 4 Shallots
2-3 Garlic Cloves
1 inch Ginger
- Serve With
Vegetables, blanched(I used Bok Choy)
Lime wedges
Fried Shallots
Directions
- Finely chop or mince the chicken.
- Finely chop or mince the spices for the rica rica sauce.
- In a pan, heat the oil. Over low heat, saute the rica rica sauce.
- Saute for 2-3 minutes, before adding bruised lemongrass and torn kaffir lime leaves.
- Saute until fragrant, and the oil takes on a reddish hue.
- Add chicken and when chicken is not pink, season with sugar, light soy sauce, dark soy sauce and crumble in stock cube.
- Stir through and let chicken finish cooking.
- Blanch noodles and leafy vegetables.
- Add in 2-3 tbsps of oil from the rica rica sauce to a bowl.
- Slide in blanched noodles, and toss through.
- Top with chicken and blanched vegetables.
- Garnish with fried onions and squeeze of lime.
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