Chinese Beef with Honey and Black Pepper Sauce

This is a pretty easy recipe that uses up some roast in the summer time since I don’t want to just use it for a pot roast all the time. I also doubled the sauce since I was serving it was rice and that usually soaks it up.

 

Chinese Beef with Honey and Black Pepper Sauce

(Adapted from Recipetin Eats)

 

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Sauce

3 tbsp soy sauce

3 tbsp honey

1½ tbsp oyster sauce

2 tbsp Chinese cooking wine or dry sherry (or substitute with chicken or beef stock)

2 tbsp water

1 tsp roughly crushed black pepper (or ½ tsp freshly ground pepper)

 

Stir Fry

1½ tbsp peanut oil (or vegetable or canola oil)

1 garlic clove, crushed

1 small onion, sliced (or ½ large onion)

1 lb / 500 g thinly sliced flank, rump, sirloin, fillet or any other cut of steak suitable for stir frying (Notes 1 & 2) I used rump roast for this recipe

 

Whisk together the Sauce ingredients then set aside.

 

 

 

Heat the oil in a wok or large heavy based skillet over high heat until it is smoking.

 

Add the onion and garlic and cook for 1 minute or until the onion becomes translucent. Keep it moving so the garlic doesn't burn.

 

 

Add the beef and stir fry for 40 seconds to 1 minute until just cooked to your liking (depending on the size of the pieces, how heavy based your wok is, strength of stove). Remove beef and onion onto a plate.

 

 

Turn the heat down to medium high. Pour the Sauce ingredients into the wok. It will start simmering very quickly. Let it cook for 1 minute or so until it becomes syrupy - the bubbles will be larger and caramel color.

 

 

 

Add the beef and onion back into the wok, along with any juices pooled on the plate. Toss in the sauce until just warmed through - 1 minute at most. Don't overcook the beef - that would be tragic!

 

 

Serve immediately with rice.

 

Notes

This recipe is not suitable for cuts like chuck, brisket, ribs or other slow cooking beef cuts.

 

Cut against the grain - When you look at the beef, you will see that the fibers are mostly going in the same direction. When slicing the beef, cut "against the grain" which means cutting the beef 90 degrees to the direction of the fibers. This will produce the most tender beef.

Tenderizing the beef: Because the beef is flash fried separately from the sauce, this ensures the beef stays tender and juicy. However, if you would like to use the technique used by restaurants to "velvet" (tenderize) the beef, then combine the slices of beef with ½ tsp baking soda (bicarb soda), 2 tbsp water, 1 tbsp soy sauce, 1 tsp sugar, 1 tbsp oil. Marinade for 30 minutes, then use as per this recipe. I rarely tenderize the beef for this recipe.