Chinese Beef with Honey Black Pepper Sauce

Tender strips of beef stir fried with a lip smacking black pepper and honey sauce. This Chinese Beef with Honey Black Pepper Sauce is one of my favorite dishes at Chinese restaurants is so easy to make at home. 15 minutes, start to finish, zero stress, normal ingredients.

Chinese Beef with Honey Black Pepper Sauce is one of my favourite dishes that I order at Chinese restaurants. Never take out. It has to be at a restaurant because I love the theatrics of how it’s served, sizzling in a cast iron dish. And it’s one of those dishes that really does benefit from being served straight away.

I don’t recreate the sizzle at home – I wish I could! If you have a cast iron dish or a small skillet so you can take it straight from the stove to the table, then you’ll get the sizzle. And I’m jealous.

But I have managed to recreate the glorious sauce for this stir fry! Sweet, salty and with a subtle peppery heat, this really does taste like what you get at restaurants. Look at it! Who could resist that??

Several years ago when I went through my take out copy-cat phase, I remember searching for a restaurant recipe for this Chinese Beef with Honey Black Pepper Sauce. Surprisingly, I couldn’t find any at all. Well, at least, any credible looking ones. I know this sounds snobby, but I can usually tell just by reading a recipe whether it is what I am after or not and none of them were right.

A honey based Asian sauce has more in it than just honey and soy sauce. If you just use those two ingredients, the flavour is quite flat. As soon as you taste it, you know something is missing. (Even if you add garlic and/or ginger).

What it needs is another layer of complexity, whether it be a splash of Chinese cooking wine, hoisin sauce or oyster sauce. Add one of these and you’ll transform a sauce from one dimensional to restaurant standard! It’s a neat trick to have up your sleeve for those fridge clean out days when you’re improvising a stir fry. 🙂

It didn’t take much experimenting to figure out a sauce for this stir fry that I think is pretty close to what you get at restaurants. And it’s easy! So easy, with a short ingredient list. This is one of those stir fries you can get on the table in 15 minutes without any stress.

So….what’s your favourite at Chinese restaurants?? – Nagi

PS The photo below is a complete fabrication. I would never help myself to such a tiny serving of Chinese Beef with Honey Black Pepper Sauce. I just wanted to use those cute Chinese dishes! 🙂

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Chinese Beef with Honey and Black Pepper Sauce

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4.98 from 36 votes

Copycat of restaurant style Chinese Beef with Honey and Black Pepper Sauce. Very fast and easy to make - it's on the table in 15 minutes! The sauce is absolutely divine - sticky, sweet, salty and with a subtle burst of heat from the black pepper.

Prep Time:10 minutes

Cook Time:5 minutes

Total Time:15 minutes

Servings:3 -4

Hover over "Servings" value to reveal recipe scaler

Author:Nagi | RecipeTin Eats

Course:Stir Fry

Cuisine:Chinese

Ingredients

Sauce

• 3 tbsp soy sauce
• 3 tbsp honey
• 1 1/2 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 1/2 tsp freshly ground pepper)

Stir Fry

• 1 1/2 tbsp peanut oil (or vegetable or canola oil)
• 1 garlic clove , crushed
• 1 small onion , sliced (or 1/2 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)

Instructions

• 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 colour.
• 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.

Recipe Notes:

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

2. Cut against the grain - When you look at the beef, you will see that the fibres 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 fibres. This will produce the most tender beef.

3. Tenderising beef: Beef stir fries are best made with decent to good quality "quick cooking" cuts of beef suited to serving as steak. However, you can use chuck beef, gravy beef, round steak or "stewing / casserole beef" (which typically need to be slow cooked to break down tough connective tissues) if you tenderise the beef before using it. If you pan fry chuck beef slices without tenderising, it's incredibly tough and chewy - basically inedible. Here's how to tenderise the beef the Chinese restaurant way:

Slice beef per recipe, then sprinkle with 1 1/4 tsp of baking soda (bi-carb). Use fingers to coat beef, set aside for 20 - 30 minutes. Rinse well in colander, shake  / pat off excess water. Beef will be intensely red (see photo in this recipe). Proceed with recipe. Prepare to be amazed how incredibly tender that beef is.

Don't try this with brisket. I tried once and it didn't work (it was still super tough).

Nutrition

Serving: 178gCalories: 350kcalCarbohydrates: 15.9g (5%)Protein: 35.8g (72%)Fat: 15.5g (24%)Saturated Fat: 5.2g (26%)Polyunsaturated Fat: 10.3gCholesterol: 69mg (23%)Sodium: 789mg (33%)Fiber: 0.5g (2%)Sugar: 13.9g

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Nutrition per serving assuming 4 servings.