Quicker Than Take-out Homemade Lo Mien

Ok, I actually wrote this post after the other one but in order for it to read properly on the blog I had to re-do the time of the post to be 10 min earlier than the first post.

Last night was the rescheduled seafood night here at Casa De Galletti which this week meant that the kids, Thomas and I were going to share 1 pound of bay scallops and Thomas was going to have not quite a 1/2 pound sockeye salmon fillet. We would be sharing some fresh broccoli too. Giselle remarked that she was in the mood for Asian food.

***Well, not so much remarked more like demanded. See we were at her friend Grace's house and we had to leave at 5 so that Marie could go get her hair cut. As we were leaving, Giselle informs me that she wants to spend the night there that night. I said no but that Marie and I would try to come up with a night before Christmas for them to do another sleep-over. As we pulled into our driveway (a mere 2 minutes later) Giselle tells me that since she couldn't eat dinner at Grace's and since she couldn't spend the night there either that she wants to go out to eat Asian food either at Dynasty Buffet or at Buffet Palace or some new place that she hasn't ever been to before. I said no, that we were eating at home. She said to me "How come Daddy gets to eat out tonight but WE don't?!" and I responded "Because Daddy works hard for his money and he can eat where ever he wants to. I've already bought the food for our dinner this evening and that's what we will be eating." She then said "Fine, but I don't want Asian noodle soup, I want something else like we get at the restaurants!"***

So the wheels start turning in my head and I realize that I have all the makings for Lo Mien. I cleared the menu item with the girl and set about making dinner. The scallops were rinsed and drained, then doused with Old Bay Seasoning and sauteed with butter over med-high heat for 3 minutes, flipped then cooked for 1 additional minute. They were removed from the pan, leaving the juice in there for poaching the salmon (7 minutes on med-high heat, covered). The broccoli was cooked in a big pot with a bit of water and loads of salt on it but it was a bust - too tough/old - none of us liked it so I pitched it into the trash.

The Lo Mien - everyone had seconds!
I put about 4 cups of water into a 3 quart sauce pan over high heat.
I poured in about 1/4 cup of Lee Kum Kee Panda Brand Oyster Flavored Sauce (BTW, the kids tried tinned smoked oysters for the first time last week and they liked them - Giselle ate 4 of them and Paul stopped after 1.5).
When this came to a boil I added a 6 oz package of Caravelle Chuka Soba (wheat soba/ramen noodles).
After 3 minutes, I skimmed the noodles out of the pan and put them aside in a medium bowl.
I then added a 16 oz package of Central Market frozen mixed vegetables to the boiling broth/water.
After 5 minutes I drained out the broth/water and dumped the veggies into the bowl with the noodles.
I returned the empty pan to the stove, lowered the heat to medium-high and poured in several tablespoons of Spectrum Naturals Organic High Heat Sunflower Oil.
While the oil heated I poured about a quarter cup of San-J Organic Whole Soybean Shoyu (naturally brewed soy sauce) over the noodles & veggies in the bowl.
When the oil was fry-hot I dumped the bowl of veggies, noodles & soy sauce into the pan and stir-fried it long enough to evenly coat all the veggies and noodles with the soy sauce and warm it all back up.
When everything is coated, take it off the stove, dump it back into the bowl used before, set it on the table and watch it disappear.
15 minutes from start to finish if you include the 5 min that it took for the water to come to a boil (I use the double filtered water from the refrigerator so it takes a little longer to come to a boil).