This $19 Noodle Dish Got My Kids Eating Chili Crisp

Week after week, my kids will often ask for one thing for weeknight dinners: pasta. While I don’t indulge this request every time, reaching for a red-sauce recipe often enough can get boring, fast—no matter how convenient or quick a simple pasta pomodoro might be, or how many ways I riff on it.

I want to get comfortable riffing on noodles outside of the red-sauce box. Earlier this week, when I was grocery shopping and looking at all the cuts of lamb left over from Easter weekend, I thought of this cumin-lamb noodle dish Lindsay Guscott developed for Chatelaine not too long ago. A simplified version of Shaanxi biang biang noodles, they’re quick to knock together and work well with beef if you’re on a non-lamb budget. I made them for my kids last night and they were a hit—chili crisp sauce and all.

Here’s the cost breakdown

I costed this out according to this week’s grocery prices at the Walmart and T&T locations near where I live, though most of these items were actually purchased at my local Nations, an east Asian grocery store that always has a large selection of fresh and frozen knife-cut noodles in stock. (Their prices are also pretty comparable.)

Minus the things I already had in my pantry, here’s how the cost broke down:

On-hand pantry items: cumin seeds, canola oil, ginger, corn starch, Chinkiang vinegar, soy sauce, chili crisp oil

• 450 g extra lean beef, $9.98
• 450 g knife-cut noodles, $4.99
• 1 onion, $1.69
• ½ head garlic, $0.87
• ½ bunch cilantro, $1.47

Grand total: $19

Ready to cook it? Get this cumin-lamb noodles recipe.

Looking for more inexpensive recipes? Try this $20 tofu stir-fry, $10 lentil soup or $27 sheet pan salad.