Lanzhou beef noodles has just opened up on Market Street in Nottingham selling hand pulled noodles. It is in the space formerly occupied by Devine Cakes (who moved just down the road) and has apparently only been open a week. I was riding by on the Tram when I spotted them and had to jump of at the next stop to double back and check them out

As the name on the sign suggests they are serving beef noodles in the Lanzhou style. The noodles are being hand pulled to order by the chef in the window, something I have not seen for a long time, I was very excited 🙂 The last place I saw this was over at Flushing in New York down in the basement of the Golden Shopping Mall at a place called Dunhuang Lanzhou Beef Noodle,

The Menu

The menu is simple and focuses as you might expect on the noodles, I went with the dish that the place was named after and asked for a bowl of Beef Noodle. Now I am not sure whether the ‘Braise Beef Noodle‘ or the ‘Original Beef Noodle‘ was the better choice, and if I am really honest I am not really 100% sure which one I got in the end, although I am pretty sure I had the ‘Original’, as that seemed familiar 🙂

Five or so minutes later after I had ordered a huge steaming Bowl of the ‘ Beef Noodle’ was set down in front of me by the charming smiling Chinese lady who seemed to be running the shop.  She suggested that I should be adding in a spoonful of the chilli paste sauce that was sitting on the table, and to be authentic I probably should of, but I kind of held back for a bit until I had checked out the tastes and flavours of the soup in front of me before I started messing it all up 🙂

This really was a lovely and filling soup, the picture does not show how large the bowl is, it was like a serving plate size. The noodles were super, you could tell that they had been prepared fresh as they had that little bit of chew that you just don’t get from the stuff out of the packet.

The stock was light but rich in flavour from braised beef bones, there was a decent amount of beef cubes in there and it was fairly tender, some bits were slightly chewy but not enough to notice just enough to add a little more of a toothsome bite. It was all very simple with just the traditional mixture of sliced radish, chopped scallion and fresh coriander to add the aromatics to the dish.

I was so delighted to chance upon this place and I hope that it is here for a while. It is so new that I could not find anything about it on the t’internet and I am going to have to pop back to check on the opening details. When I asked about a menu I was shown the one on the chalkboard and pricewise everything seemed to be £7.

I am most certainly coming back here again, and next time I might be braver with the chilli sauce just like the people back in Lanzhou would be.

Lanzhou Beef Noodles is located at 17 Market Street in Nottingham (that is the road that the tram runs up from the square past Debenhams)