Go Back
A plate of yakisoba — glossy stir-fried wheat noodles with thin strips of pork belly, green cabbage, julienned carrot, and bean sprouts, dusted with green aonori seaweed powder and topped with red pickled ginger

Yakisoba: Japanese Stir-Fried Noodles

Sweet-savory yakisoba with pork belly, cabbage, and chewy wheat noodles in a from-scratch 3-2-1-1 sauce, finished with aonori and pickled red ginger.
Print Recipe Pin Recipe
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 12 minutes
Total Time 27 minutes
Servings: 4 servings
Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients
  

For the sauce
  • 3 tablespoons tonkatsu sauce Bull-Dog is the classic
  • 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
  • 1 tablespoon oyster sauce
  • 1 tablespoon sugar
  • 1 tablespoon sake
For the stir-fry
  • 400 g fresh yakisoba noodles 14 oz; 4 packets of pre-steamed noodles
  • 300 g pork belly cut into 5 mm strips; thinly sliced pork loin also works
  • 300 g green cabbage about 1/2 medium head, cut into bite-size pieces
  • 1 medium carrot julienned
  • 1 medium onion thinly sliced
  • 100 g bean sprouts
  • 2 tablespoons neutral oil
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt plus more to taste
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
For serving
  • 2 teaspoons aonori (green seaweed powder)
  • 2 tablespoons beni shoga (pickled red ginger)
  • Kewpie mayonnaise optional, for drizzling

Method
 

  1. Mix the sauce. In a small bowl, whisk the tonkatsu sauce, Worcestershire sauce, oyster sauce, sugar, and sake until the sugar dissolves. Set it by the stove — everything moves fast from here.
  2. Separate the noodles. Loosen the yakisoba noodles with your hands so no clumps remain. Cold noodles straight from the fridge go in as a brick and cook unevenly; separated noodles sear instead of steam.
  3. Sear the pork. Heat the oil in a large wok or skillet over high heat until it shimmers. Add the pork, salt, and pepper and stir-fry 2–3 minutes until the edges turn golden and the fat starts rendering. Push the pork to the side of the pan.
  4. The 90-second char. Add the noodles to the empty side of the pan and spread them flat. Leave them alone for a full 90 seconds — no tossing. You want golden, slightly crisped spots. Add a tablespoon of water if the noodles look dry; it steams off almost instantly.
  5. Add the vegetables. Toss in the cabbage, carrot, and onion and stir-fry 2 minutes, until the cabbage just starts to wilt at the edges but keeps its crunch. Stir in the bean sprouts last — they need only about 30 seconds.
  6. Sauce, last. Pour the sauce over everything in the final 60 seconds and toss to coat. Taste: it should be sweet-tangy with a glossy sheen and no sauce pooling at the bottom of the pan.
  7. Plate and top. Slide onto plates, then scatter the aonori over the top and pile on the beni shoga. A zigzag of Kewpie mayonnaise is the Osaka-stall move. Serve immediately, while the noodles are still glossy.

Notes

Note 1: Separate the noodles by hand before they touch the pan. Cold noodles from the fridge go in as a brick and fuse into one clump; separated strands sear and char instead.
Note 2: Get the pan genuinely hot before the noodles go in — you want an audible sizzle on contact. A lukewarm pan steams the par-cooked noodles and they turn limp.
Note 3: Add the sauce in the final 60 seconds only. The sugar in it burns on high heat, so sauce added early chars before it has a chance to coat the noodles.
Note 4: Pork goes in before the vegetables. Thin pork strips need 2–3 minutes to render and brown; cabbage needs barely 2 minutes — added together, the pork steams and the cabbage overcooks.
Note 5: Cut the cabbage chunky, not shredded. Shredded cabbage collapses in a minute; bite-size pieces stay crisp through the whole stir-fry.