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How can I make the dough for Chinese ramen noodles stretchy? It keeps breaking when I pull just a little bit.

I used wheat flour, water, and baking soda. What else am I missing?

EDIT: 400g flour 200g water 1 teaspoon baking soda.

I mixed everything together and started to knead the dough for about 5minutes then i saw it just breaks, so i knead it for about another 10min or more.

user3524910
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    Could you edit the question and tell us the ratios of your ingredients, and any steps you might be taking like kneading, resting, and so on? As-is, it's probably hard to help since we're not sure what it is you're doing. – mech Mar 20 '18 at 13:43
  • edited, im just a regular person, and there are not that many steps when it comes to dough, well i followed a recipe but there should be some secret ingridient to make it stretchy. – user3524910 Mar 20 '18 at 14:01
  • You may find some useful information in the answers to this question: https://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/9072/what-flour-and-technique-do-i-need-for-hand-pulled-noodles?rq=1 – Cindy Mar 20 '18 at 14:06

1 Answers1

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Baking soda, being alkaline, makes the dough unstretchable. The hand-pulled noodles recipes I see on the internet do not contain baking soda. But even if you use a noodle maker, you need to add wheat gluten if you want to include baking soda.

More info here : Use high gluten (bread) flour for hand pulled noodles

also: What flour and technique do I need for hand pulled noodles?

Backyard Chef
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  • It is exactly the alkaline compound which makes the pulled noodles dough stretchable and of the right consistency. There is a reason they are called "kansui noodles" (lye noodles). It might be that the alkalinity is not yet right (I suspect too low) but your logic here is the wrong way round. – rumtscho Mar 21 '18 at 06:58
  • According to https://www.google.com.sg/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=9&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjw8rLpuP_ZAhXMM48KHXTCBcMQFgh0MAg&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.aaccnet.org%2Fpublications%2Fcc%2Fbackissues%2F1996%2FDocuments%2F73_708.pdf&usg=AOvVaw1KfwiAj93eTFI3YosNu774, "Extensigraph testing indicated that doughs containing alkaline salts were tougher and less extensible...". Also, acid is known to make dough more extensible, so alkalinity should have the opposite effect. – Backyard Chef Mar 22 '18 at 07:57
  • "alkalinity should have the opposite effect" - no, gluten is weakest at neutral pHs and gets stronger as you get either more acidic or more alkaline. You probably learned that about acid in the context of bread doughs, which are neutral to acidic. And yes, "were tougher" is exactly what the OP should be looking for - tough materials don't break apart when you pull them. Also if you want a certain result, you should stick to the traditional methods before you try deviating, and this recipe has too low alkalinity compared to traditional, seems like a bad substitute. – rumtscho Mar 22 '18 at 08:34