This recipe is a fairly faithful rendition of Mr. Xie's Dan Dan Noodles, from the excellent cookbook The Food of Sichuan, which I highly recommend if you like the food from that region. You'll see all the notes on special ingredients and substitutions above.
3 to 10small, hot chiles, fresh or dried, sliced or crumbled
1/2poundfinely ground duck, pork, beef or some other meat
1teaspoonground Sichuan pepper(optional)
2ouncesTianjin preserved vegetable or yibin yacai,rinsed off and squeezed dry
3teaspoonssoy sauce
NOODLES
1poundChinese wheat noodles or vermicelli
4teaspoonssesame paste
2teaspoonssesame oil
4tablespoonschile oil
4tablespoonsoy sauce
1teaspoonground Sichuan pepper(optional)
1/4cupminced chives
Instructions
TOPPING
Heat the peanut oil in a wok or heavy frying pan over high heat. When it's hot, add the chiles and stir fry about 30 seconds, until you can smell them. Add the ground meat and stir to combine. Stir fry over very high heat until the meat has browned, then add the remaining topping ingredients, toss to combine and cook for another minute or so. Turn off the heat.
NOODLES
Before you even start the topping, get a large pot of water over a burner set over high heat. You want it to be boiling when you are done with the topping, although it's not critical that both are done at the same time.
After the topping is ready and the water boiling, add the noodles and gently stir them so they don't stick to each other. These typically only need maybe 3 minutes or so to be ready, but follow the directions on the package.
While the noodles are boiling, divide all the other noodle ingredients - except for the minced chives - among four deep bowls. To serve, give everyone some noodles over the sauce ingredients, add some topping and some chives, and let everyone stir and mix and eat!