I’m not any kind of Chinese food chef – nor do I claim to really know a lot about the modern Americanized version of Chinese cuisine – but I do know a good meal when I see one. This dish isn’t anything fancy, but it has all the elements of a good meal thrown nicely together in one dish.
There’s no need to spend a lot of money on fancy cuts of beef for this recipe either – although you can if you wish. Let me say though, if you do decide on a better cut of meat, you will end up with a more tender finished product. But what this recipe produces is more than tender enough in my opinion. Many supermarkets will have pre-cut beef strips, and they’ll usually be labeled something like “beef for stir fry”, or something similar. These are great for this dish, however they will probably need to be sliced thinner for marinating.
We’ll be slicing the meat into strips and then letting them sit in an acidic marinade (using pineapple juice) for an hour or so before cooking it and that will help with the tenderness of the beef. Browning the meat over high heat after sitting in the marinade will lock in the juices from the beef, and that is exactly what we want.
Next, we’ll be using Lo Mein egg noodles. They are a wheat based noodle with egg in it. The type I’m using doesn’t contain yolks. You should be able to find Lo Mein noodles in most larger grocery stores. If not, you may need to go to a more specialized store such as an Asian market to find them.
In addition, the Lo Mein noodles used for this recipe have been dried so they will need to be boiled longer than if you were to use fresh Lo Mein noodles. So keep that in mind. If you have dried ones like the ones used in the recipe below, just stick with what the recipe says. That will make things easy.
Other than letting the beef marinade for an hour prior to cooking, this dish really doesn’t take much time to make. You might have to adjust the cooking time a little bit depending on how well done you like your vegetables. I don’t tend to like vegetables that have been cooked so much that they’ve lost all their texture and become limp and soggy, or have become completely charred on the outside due to excessive frying.
Oh, and if you’re like Vanessa and can’t get enough ginger don’t hesitate to add more than what the recipe calls for. I don’t know how you could go wrong with sautéed strips of beef layered with the taste of garlic, ginger, and sweet teriyaki all mixed together with crunchy celery and fried Lo Mein noodles. Super simple but super tasty!
Let us know what you think in the comment section below.
Garlic Teriyaki Beef With Lo Mein Noodles
By: Semiserious Chefs
Serves: 6 – 8
Ingredients:
Beef marinade: (double the marinade recipe if using more than 2 lbs of beef)
- 1 – 2 lbs beef strips thinly sliced (1.5 lbs worked great)
- 1 tablespoon corn starch
- 1/4 cup soy sauce
- 2 tablespoons Sherry wine
- 1 teaspoon miso
- 1/4 cup pineapple juice
- 1 teaspoon fresh ginger minced (or more to taste)
Other ingredients:
- Vegetable oil for sautéing
- 2 cups celery (sliced)
- 2 cups green onions (sliced in one inch sections)
- 2 cloves garlic finely diced (about 2 teaspoons, or more to taste)
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1/4 cup brown sugar
- (About) 6 oz. lo mein noodles
- 1/4 cup water (optional)
Directions:
- Slice beef into thin strips and set aside.
- Add the rest of the “Beef marinade” ingredients in a large bowl, and whisk until the corn starch has been thoroughly incorporated. Add sliced beef to marinade and set aside to marinade for an hour.
- While the beef strips are marinating, fill a large pot with enough water to easily cover the lo mein noodles. Salt the water as you see fit and bring the water to a boil.
- Add the lo mein noodles and cook for roughly 6 minutes.
- Remove from heat and fill pot with cold water so the noodles will stop cooking. Leave in cold water for later.
- Finely dice garlic and slice the celery and green onions.
- In a large skillet, add 1 – 2 teaspoons vegetable oil (or whatever oil you want) to pan and heat over high heat until oil is hot but not smoking. About a minute.
- Carefully pour the all the beef strips along with any remaining marinade into the hot skillet.
- Cook over high heat for 3 – 4 minutes stirring occasionally.
- The mixture will begin to get very liquidy, so after the 3 -4 minutes, drain beef and return to heat. This way it can begin to sear again as opposed to boiling.
- Cook for another 2 – 3 minutes and then remove beef and add it to a large clean bowl.
- In another large skillet add 2 teaspoons vegetable oil and heat over medium-high heat until oil is hot but not burning.
- Add the diced garlic and celery to the skillet and sauté over medium-high heat for for about 2 minutes stirring often. The celery will retain most of its crunch so if you want softer celery you will have to either sauté it for longer or add a touch of water to help the cooking process along.
- Next, add the green onions and sauté everything for an additional minute.
- Drain lo mein noodles and drop them in with the vegetables. Do the same with the cooked sliced beef. Continue sautéing everything over medium-high heat while continuing to stir often.
- Finally, add the 2 final tablespoons of soy sauce, and the 1/4 cup of brown sugar and stir well.
- If you find the whole thing to be a little dryer than your liking, add some extra water 1/4 cup at a time.
- Continue cooking until it just starts to thicken. 2 -3 minutes should do it.
Post a comment