Day 150: Mongolian Beef

Happy Memorial Day!  As you're out and about celebrating the long weekend, don't forget to thank a veteran for their service and sacrifice and most importantly, your freedom.  Thank you veterans!  I get to spend today decorating graves.  We are the only members of my hubby's family in the area so we get cemetery duty.  We actually have a lot of fun-in a morbid kind of way. 

A friend gave me this recipe and she swears it tastes just like PF Chang's Mongolian beef.  Now, I've never tried their version, so I can't vouch for the authenticity of this recipe.  But it sounded good so we gave it a try.

Mongolian Beef
12" dutch oven

4 tsp. vegetable oil
2 tsp. ginger, minced
2 Tbsp. garlic, minced
1 c. soy sauce
1 c. water
1 c. brown sugar (packed)
1 cup vegetable oil
2 Lb. flank steaks (I used a boneless beef roast, sliced thin)
½ c. cornstarch
3 large green onions

Make the sauce by heating 4 tsp. vegetable oil in a 10" dutch oven over medium/low heat. Don’t get the oil too hot. Add ginger and garlic to the pan and quickly add the soy sauce and water before the garlic scorches. Dissolve the brown sugar in the sauce, then raise the heat to medium and boil the sauce 2-3 minutes or until sauce thickens a little bit. Remove sauce from heat.

Slice the flank steak against the grain into 1/4 inch slices. Tilt the blade of your knife at about a 45 degree angle to the top of the steak so you get wider cuts. Dip the steak pieces into cornstarch to apply a very thin dusting to both sides of each piece of beef. Let the beef sit about 10 min. so the cornstarch sticks. As the beef sits, heat up 1 c. oil in your 12" dutch oven. Heat the oil until its hot, but not smoking.  I used as many coals as I could fit under my dutch oven.   Add the beef to the oil and saute for just 2 minutes, or until beef just begins to darken on the edges. Stir the meat around a little bit so that it cooks evenly.

After a few minutes, use a large slotted spoon to take the meat out and onto paper towels, then pour most of the oil out of the dutch oven. Put the pot back over the heat, dump the meat back into it and stir-fry for 1 minute. Add the sauce, cook for 1 minute while stirring and add green onions. Cook for 1 more minute. Now at this point you can either remove the beef with a slotted spoon or tongs and discard the sauce (this is what P.F. Chang's does) OR thicken the sauce with a cornstarch-water mixture to desired thickness and serve it over rice with the beef.

The Finished Product

The Review

I don't know how this compares to PF Chang's recipe, but this was GOOD!!  I cooked mine a little longer than the recipe calls for, partly because my hubby wasn't home from work yet and partly because dutch ovens heat and cook just a little slower than your stove top.  I used a 5 pound roast and there wasn't 1 piece of meat leftover, if that tells you how good this was.  The instructions are long, but the procedure is simple.  You really should make this....tonight!  Grade A.