Noodles With Chicken & Deep-Fried Garlic)

Soak mushrooms and rice vermicelli in separate bowls of hot water 20 minutes, remove tough mushroom stems and cut caps into thin strips. Drain noodles.

In soup pot or deep skillet, heat about 1 Tablespoon oil and saute 1 1/2 tsp. Of minced garlic and onion until tender but not browned. Add chicken and water. Cover and simmer about 20 minutes or until meat falls away from bones. Remove chicken from broth. Chill broth and remove fat or, if you are not working ahead, just degrease warm broth. Shred chicken meat. (Can do above ahead.) Combine defatted broth and fish sauce and bring mixture to boiling. Add rice sticks and simmer about 5 minutes until most of liquid is absorbed. There should be some unabsorbed broth with noodles to act as sauce for all ingredients.

Meanwhile, heat remaining oil in small heavy skillet and deep-fry remaining garlic just until pale golden. Pour oil through strainer and drain garlic on paper toweling.

Heat 2 Tablespoons of garlic oil in wok or skillet. Stir-fry chorizo until heated through. Add carrot and fry until almost crisp-tender, add cabbage and mushrooms and continue to stir-fry until cabbage is almost crisp-tender. Stir in chicken, then stir vegetable mixture into noodles. Arrange noodle mixture on platter and surround with hard- cooked egg quarters. Sprinkle fried garlic over noodles.

Makes 3 main-dish servings or 6 side-dish servings.