Mongolian Beef

I had starred this in Google Reader several weeks ago after Christine of Cooking with Christine posted it. We are huge fans of Asian food in our house, but we don't normally eat it because A) Making it at home normally requires a lot of prep work, B) Take-out Chinese is incredibly bad for you, and C) there is a severe shortage of Asian food in our area outside of your standard Chinese. I am a huge fan of Thai, Vietnamese, and Japanese, but we just don't have it around here. So when I saw this recipe, I had to make it. Its very simple, has only a few ingredients, and uses flank steak which I just recently discovered and love. Granted, its a PF Chang recipe which probably isn't overly authentic Asian food, but like I said, its easy to prepare.

The recipe comes together fairly ease. The sauce was very simple to make and the beef cooks very quickly because it is sliced pretty thin. I served it with rice and broccoli. Normally, I would cook brown rice, but I completely forgot about a starchy side until I was ready to cook the meat. Brown rice normally takes around 40 minutes, so there was no way I was going to have time to make it.

I really liked the flavor of the dish- it has a lot of sugar in it, but it was very tasty. The only thing I would change next time it to use fresh ginger instead of powder. But I forgot to pick it up at the store and the meat had already been defrosted for two days, so I really couldn't wait for another trip to the store. I think my husband liked it. He's kind of hard to get any sort of reaction out of except for going back for seconds. Here is how it normally goes down at the table.

"What do you think?"

"It's good."

"Should I make it again sometime?"

"Yeah- I would"

Sometimes he will say "This is a definite repeat" and then he'll go back for seconds. But he didn't go back for seconds last night which makes me suspicious. Don't get me wrong, I love my husband dearly, he's just not expressive about food. That is unless its about his mom's baked rigatoni recipe. Everytime I make that he says "I love this dinner. And you do such a great job with it!" And then my heart melts...

Here is the recipe if you would like to give it a try...

P. F. Chang's® Mongolian Beef

Recipe from Meemo's Kitchen

Sauce

2 teaspoons vegetable oil
1/2 teaspoon minced ginger
1 tablespoon chopped garlic
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup water
3/4 cup dark brown sugar

1 cup vegetable oil
1 pound flank steak (to make slicing easier, put the beef in the freezer for 30-45 minutes to freeze slightly)
1/4 cup cornstarch
4-6 large green onions

For the sauce:

Heat 2 teaspoons of vegetable oil in a saucepan over medium-low heat. Add ginger and garlic to the pan. Quickly add the soy sauce and water before the garlic scorches. If your oil is too hot, this may splatter, so be careful. Dissolve the brown sugar in the sauce, then bring the heat up to medium heat and allow the sauce to boil for 2-3 minutes or until the sauce thickens. Remove from heat.

Slice the slightly frozen flank steak against the grain into 1/4-inch thick slices. Tilt the blade of your knife at about a forty five degree angle to the top of the steak so that you get wider cuts.Coat the steak pieces with a very thin coating of the cornstarch on both sides of each piece of beef. Let the beef sit for about 10 minutes so that the cornstarch sticks.

Heat one cup of oil in a wok or skillet over medium heat until it's hot, but not smoking. Add the beef to the oil and sauté for two minutes, or until the beef just begins to darken on the edges. Stir the meat so that it cooks evenly. After a couple minutes, use a large slotted spoon or a spider to take the meat out and onto paper towels.

Pour the oil out of the wok or skillet. Put the pan back over the heat, add the meat back into the wok or skillet and simmer for one minute. Add the sauce, cook for one minute while stirring. Add the green onions. Cook for one more minute, then remove the beef and onions with tongs or a slotted spoon to a serving plate. Leave the excess sauce behind in the pan.

*NOTE I used much less oil for frying the beef. It was probably about 1/4 cup and I used a nonstick frying pan.