Healthy and yummy oyster beef with Chinese broccoli is on my top lists of Beef stir-fry recipes. I am not familiar with both ingredients before moving to Guangdong province.
At the first several attempts, I love oyster sauce. This sauce with unique sweet flavor usually highlights many green vegetables like lettuce leafs and broccoli. However I feel slightly unlike the taste of Chinese broccoli compared with another popular Cantonese green vegetable -Yu Choy. There are quite similar in appearance, but taste totally different. However after several years in this place, I just fell in love with it. This experience is quite similar to my emotion for Shaanxi Cuisine. I began to love Shaanxi dishes in the third year of my university life after two struggling years. Finally, I found the highlights and shining parts. Though different from my familiar Sichuan cuisine, they are excellent too.
Chinese broccoli is the best partner for beef for me, follows snow peas, broccoli and celery.
Cook’s Note
- Since the dish is loaded with a heavy and thick sauce, you can use cheap cuts of beef.
- When cutting the beef, it is important to comply with the “against the grain” rule, which helps to cut off the fiber and create a tender texture.
- The most difficult part for meat stir frying is to marinating process. If the marinating is not well done, you will end up with dry, chewy and plaint beef slices after stir frying. Use enough liquid to marinate the beef (I use cooking wine this time). Use cold vegetable cooking oil to coat the beef slices to avoid the starch escaping (脱浆).
Instructions
Add stir fry sauce and blanched Chinese broccoli. Mix well and transfer out completely.
Slice the beef against the grain. Transfer the beef slices to a bowl and add all the marinating sauces except the oil. Grasp with hand to make sure beef slices absorb the marinating sauces. Then coat with 1 tablespoon of vegetable cooking oil. Set aside to marinate 15-20 minutes. If you feel the beef is too dry, you can add a small amount of water.
2. During this time, remove any tough skin of the Chinese broccoli. Bring water to boil in a large pot, add 1 teaspoon of sesame oil. Blanch Chinese broccoli until the water boils once again.
In a small bowl, mix oyster sauce, dark soy sauce, sugar and sesame oil together.
Add 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil in a hot wok (you need to heat the wok firstly) with ginger slices. Place the beef in when the oil is warm but not hot. Let it stay for a while and then fry for a while until the beef changes color (Don’t overcook the beef ).
Add stir fry sauce and blanched Chinese broccoli. Mix well and transfer out completely.
Other Chinese beef recipes
- Beef Chow Fun, pan-fried beef with rice noodles
- Hunan beef, a spicy beef stir fry dish popular across China
- Szechuan shredded beef stir fry, seriously Szechuan style hot and dry beef shreds.
- Ground beef rice bowl, stir fry minced beef and serve with rice
Oyster Beef with Chinese Broccoli
Ingredients
- 150 g beef , sliced
- 6-8 Chinese broccoli , tough skin removed and drained well
- 1 tsp. sesame oil , for blanching broccoli
- 2 tbsp. cooking oil
- 4 ginger slices
- pinch of salt , for blanching broccoli
Marinating sauce
- 1 tbsp. starch , I use sweet potato starch in video
- 1 tbsp. oyster sauce
- 1/4 tsp. sugar
- 1 tbsp. Chinese cooking wine
- 1/4 tsp. white pepper
- 1 tbsp. vegetable cooking oil
Stir-frying sauce
- 2 tsp. oyster sauce
- 1/4 tsp. sugar
- 1 tsp. sesame oil
- 1 tsp. dark soy sauce , for darken the color
Instructions
- Slice the beef against the grain.
- Transfer the beef slices to a bowl and add all the marinating sauces except the oil. Grasp with hand to make sure beef slices absorb the marinating sauces. Then coat with 1 tablespoon of vegetable cooking oil. Set aside to marinate at least 15 minutes. You can also prepare the marinating beef in ahead and place it in fridge overnight.
- During this time, remove any tough skin of the Chinese broccoli. And then cut into sections with angle. Separate the leaves too. Bring water to boil in a large pot, add 1 teaspoon of sesame oil and a small pinch of salt (this step can help to keep the green color of the leaves and the crunchy texture, applying to all dark leafy vegetables ). Add Chinese broccoli in, stem firstly and leaves secondly. Blanch Chinese broccoli until the water boils again. Transfer out and drain.
- In a small bowl, mix oyster sauce, dark soy sauce, sugar and sesame oil together.
- Add 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil in a hot wok with ginger slices (the wok should be heated firstly). Place the beef in when the oil is warm but not hot. Let it stay for a while until the starch finish gelatinization and then fry for a while until the beef changes color (Don't overcook the beef ).
- Add stir fry sauce and blanched Chinese broccoli. Mix well and transfer out completely.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
Hi my friend. A boo-boo to correct:
You write “Since the dish is loaded with a heavy and thick sauce, you can use cheap cuts of beef. In fact, in most authentic Chinese beef stir frying dishes, we use tenderloin.”
Beef tenderloin is in fact the single most expensive and “luxurious” cut of meat out there. It is the muscle least exercised, and as a result is extraordinarily tender, although for the same reason lacking the juiciness intra-muscular of other cuts.
I believe the normal household and restaurant cut for this is thinly cut flank steak, which, FWIW the only beef sold in Chinatown (Manhattan NYC) worth buying, currently at about $9/lb, about half that in the general supermarket. (The other cheap(er) and tremendously versatile beef cut in Chinese cooking is shin, for braising, etc.) Note that all flank steak in supermarkets is trimmed of a surface layer of inedible white cartilage; you can strip off that layer yourself, but it’s a pain in the #%^*, Untrimmed flank portions are also sold in Chinatown for less money/lb, but their preparation involves long braising (ie not stir-fry.)
Keep writing and helping all of us to enjoy life.
Still waiting for my book
Wow
Chinese lamb shank recipe
I will arrange in this winter.
With beef being so expensive in our area during coronavirus, we made this with chicken instead. Very good, a hit with the whole family. I added a bit of garlic too.
Hi Elaine, I have been cooking your recipes for about 4 years now. They have brought my husband and I great joy and the dishes never fail to take me back to my time in China. We love and appreciate all you do! Do you have a cookbook?
Thank you, Amanda! Currently No. But I promise to get one in the future.
Hi Elaine,
I am looking forward to making this for my dinner!
I am curious, would you normally have this dish on its own, or would you serve it with rice or noodles?
It’s a savory dish. So I will match with steamed rice and soups.