Mei Fun—Rice Noodles

What is Mei Fun

Mei fun also known as Mai Fun is a type of rice noodles with the Chinese name (米粉). Rice noodles are one of the featured snacks of the Han nationality and now are especially popular in sourest part of China and other Asia countries such as Singapore.

Judging from the name, we know that rice noodles are made from rice, more actually rice flour. In Chinese, 米粉 is pronounced as mǐ fěn meaning the rice vermicelli.

There are several representative brands of rice noodles: including Guilin Rice noodles(桂林米粉) in Guangxi Province and thin rice noodles in Taiwan area and the MianYang rice noodles（绵阳米粉） in Sichuan province.

People in some provinces of China also call Mei Fun as Mi Xian(米线). Generally those two are the same except for one type this is originated from Yunnan province. The Mi Xian in Yunnan province is only made with rice however the common Mei fun also contains certain amounts of sweet potato flour or potato flour.

The shape of rice noodles varies from the areas and also the cooking method. Both fresh and dried mei fun are available in market.

Following is a picture of Guilin rice noodles.

And this is a common thin rice noodles in supermarket.

How to cook Mei Fun

Basically there are two basic way of cooking those delicious Mei Fun one is stir-fry for example Singapore style stir-fried mei fun(星洲炒米) and the other is Mei Fun soup such as spicy mei fun soups which are quite popular in Hunan province(one representative is Changsha Mei Fun 长沙米粉) and the western area of China.

If you ever visited Guiling, then you might taste lots of rice noodles dishes for example hot and sour rice noodle, beef rice noodle and mild rice noodles.

There are some basic mei fun recipes for some inspirations.

Vegetable fried Mei fun

Spicy Mei Fun soup

Hot and sour Mei Fun Soup

Singapore style stir-fried mei fun