Chinese Five-Spice Braised Beef with Daikon

I had asked my mum for her Chinese  five-spice braised beef recipe probably a good ten years ago if not longer. I used to make it a lot but eased up the past few years as I tried to eat more healthy. I had a craving for it the other day so marched on down to my favorite butcher shop Drewes Bros. Meats (which also happens to be around the corner from me – how convenient!) to buy some meat. They offer high-quality meats and seafood.

In the past, I’d buy all my meat at Ranch 99, Costco, and Safeway since it was so cheap. However, a number of years ago, I started to educate myself on grass-fed vs corn-fed and antibiotic vs antibiotic-free and factory feedlots vs pasture. Can we say yikes! At that point, I realized that I needed to pick and choose the type of meat I bought.

Since I cook a lot of Chinese food, I preferred going to the Chinese market for a lot of my meats because  the cuts I need can be slightly different at an Asian versus non-Asian market. For example, I make this “1-2-3-4-5″ ribs dish (I”ll blog about it in a future post) but I like to use ribs that are cut into much smaller bite sized pieces. Or the non-Asian market may not offer what I’m looking for (e.g. beef tendon). The great thing about a butcher shop such as Drewes is the owner has told me that he can basically get anything I need usually within a day or two depending on when I request it. And they can cut the meat any way I want.

At Drewes, I told what I was making and asked them what cut I should use. I tried to explain the cut I usually got at the Asian market (“it’s cut relatively thin, long, can have this casing on it, and they roll it up“, fully admitting I didn’t know what it was called. They called out a few different cuts and I just gave them a blank stare. I guess I was hoping they’d magically know what I meant. They were polite and suggested I find out what the cut was and let them know. I ended up choosing the beef brisket and got 3lbs worth.

I also had bought a daikon from the San Rafael farmers market the previous weekend so decided to add that to the mix.

The brisket was a bit larger than I’d normally use but thought if I was going to have this braise for over 2 hours, I’d like to have some leftovers for lunch.

Ingredients

2-3lb beef brisket

3-4 large slices of ginger

1 C water

1 large daikon

marinade

2 tsp five-spice powder

2 anise

1 tsp Chinese cooking wine

2 tsp light soy sauce

2 tsp dark soy sauce

1 tsp sugar

1 tsp oyster sauce

Boil water in a pot. This will be used to blanch the meat to remove excess fat.

Prepare marinade. In a small bowl, add 2tsp five-spice powder.

Add 2 pieces of anise.

Next comes 1 tsp Chinese cooking wine.

Add 2 tsp each light and dark soy sauces.

Add 1 tsp sugar.

Add 1 tsp oyster sauce. Psst, this is my go-to brand.

Mix all marinade ingredients together. Set aside.

Peel the daikon and cut into thick discs. Set aside.

Cut the meat into 2″x2″ chunks.

Once the water is boiling, drop the beefs chunks into the water. Leave for about 30 seconds then remove to a separate plate. You will probably have to do this in batches unless you have a huge pot.

Take another pot (or wok) and heat it up over high. Add a bit of canola oil. Cut 3-4 large slices of ginger and add to the pot. Brown the beef. Do in batches if necessary. Don’t try to cram it all in the pot.

Add marinade to the pot and mix together.

Add approximately 1 C of water to the pot and stir.

Add daikon to pot.

Bring to a slow simmer and cover pot. Check periodically and give meat a quick stir. If it looks like the water is evaporating too fast (fast simmer happening?), adjust your temperature down (make sure to maintain slow simmer) and add a bit of water. Braise for at least 2 hours.

Once done, separate the meat from the sauce. Once cooled, place the sauce in the fridge for a few hours to harden. Scrape off the layer of fat. Re-add sauce to the meat.

Here are the results.

The meat was tender and not dry which was my biggest concern. Anna thought it could a bit more salt so I added 1 tbsp each light and dark soy sauce to the pot after it was cooked and mixed in. That seemed to work. I felt it needed to have another texture other than pure meat with every bite so next time I’ll add beef tendon . I also would like to experiment and maybe use a blend of meat like brisket, cheek, and/or shank and see how that works. I also think I could add the daikon in towards the end; maybe at the 1 or 1 1/2 hour mark. They were good but a little too soft and broke up too easily. Finally I think I will adjust the marinade ingredient measurements and see how the taste changes.

Overall, I’d make this dish again as I prepared it but will be experimenting as outlined above.

Thanksgiving 2010

I ordered a 10.81 lb Free-Range Willie Bird Turkey from our neighborhood butcher Drewes. I decided to dry-brine again this year except I’d have to do it one less day since earliest pickup was on 11/22. No matter I was ready to go. Menu was picked out: I would make the roast turkey, oyster stuffing (Anna’s favorite!), sour cream mashed potato, gravy, and a simple broccoli dish. Anna was in charge of the sweet potato biscuits, cranberries, and pumpkin pie (another favorite!).

All of this food for the three of us! We like turkey leftovers and leftovers we would have.

To dry-brine the bird I used the same recipe as I used last year from latimes.com. For every 5 lbs of bird, use 1 tbsp of salt. So I had a touch over 2 tbsps to massage my bird with.

Take the bird out of the plastic wrap.

Don’t forget to take out the bag of insides and the neck. Save the neck for jook (aka rice porridge).

Clean the bird by rinsing under cold water.

Dry with a paper towel.

Oh. Don’t forget to cut the butt off.

Lightly salt turkey inside with a bit of salt.

Take about 1 tbsp of salt and massage into breast area.

Turn bird on its side and sprinkle about half of the remaining salt on the side and massage in, concentrating on the thighs. Flip the bird over and using the remaining salt, do the same with the other side.

Take a brining bag. I got some from Williams-Sonoma. Comes in a pack of four – two large bags and two small ones.

Place turkey in bag, squeeze out the air and seal tight.

Place in fridge. Ideally over the next three days, massage the salt into the bird every so often. I half hardly did it once. Kind of. And like I mentioned at the beginning of this post I only had two days to work with.

This is what the turkey looked like after the two days of brining. No visible salt. I took a paper towel and gently patted it down.

Place turkey breast side up on a plate and refrigerate uncovered for at least 8 hours.

On the day you are to cook it, take it out of the fridge, and leave it at room temperature for at least 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 425F.

Place the turkey on a rack breast side down and put in oven for 30 minutes.

Take the turkey out of the oven and reduce the heat to 325F.

Turn turkey so that it sits breast side down on the roasting rack.

Add a couple slabs of butter to the breast.

Place turkey back into oven and roast until a thermometer inserted in the deepest part of the thigh, but not touching the bone, reads 165 degrees. Do initial check after one and half hours to see what the temperature is at. Check every 10-15 minutes thereafter.

Unfortunately what happened to me was Lilly was crying and I had to tend to her so I forgot to turn the temperature down to 325F while following the rest of the steps. I didn’t realize this until a good half and hour later. I quickly turned it down and cursed to no end. I ended up taking it out at the two hour mark and the thermometer zoomed all the way to 180F! It was cooked (sigh).

Take turkey out and tent loosely with foil for about half an hour. Slice and serve!

Given my mistake, I cringed when I took my first bite of turkey but it wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. Yes, it was a bit dry but I’ve had much drier elsewhere. A pity considering I used the same recipe last year and the meat was super moist.

Happy Thanksgiving one and all!

Homestyle Sweet and Sour Chicken

Adapted from Grace Young’s Sweet and Sour Chicken recipe found in her The Breath of a Wok.

1 lbs skinless, boneless chicken breast, cut into cubes

2-3 garlic cloves, sliced

2 tsp soy sauce

1 tsp Chinese cooking wine

1 1/2 tsp cornstarch

1/2 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp salt

8 shakes of ground white pepper

1 tbsp plus 1 tsp canola oil

1 or 2 green onions, cut into 2″ pieces

5 or 6 pineapple slices, cut into small sections

sauce

2/3 C chicken broth

2 tsp dark soy sauce

2 tsp sesame oil

2 tbsp rice vinegar

2 tbsp ketchup

1 tbsp sugar

2 tsp soy sauce

1 1/2 tsp corn starch

1/4 tsp salt

I prefer the more traditional sweet and sour pork dish found in restaurants or the one found in my Aunt#3′s cookbook but this one requires much less work, is something you can do quickly for dinner and is still pretty tasty.

In small bowl, combine sauce ingredients and set aside. Cut chicken into cubes and place in bowl.

Add marinade items to cubed chicken and mix. Set aside.

Heat wok over high heat. Add 1 tbsp oil.

Spread chicken out in wok and let cook for a minute. Stir-fry until almost cooked through. Set aside.

Swirl in 2 tsp oil  and add green onion. Stir- fry briefly.

Stir sauce and swirl into the wok.

Add Chicken to wok.

Stir-fry another minute or two and ensure chicken coated nicely.

Add pinapple to wok and incorporate.

Scoop to plate and serve immediately!

Chicken Chow Fun with Bean Sprouts

Chicken chow fun with bean spouts was pretty easy and quick to make. Longest time was spent cutting up the chicken. Adapted rice noodles with stir-fried beef and vegetables recipe taken from Regional Cooking of China cookbook.

1 lb skinless, boneless chicken (I used thighs but you could use breast meat. Or substitute beef)

marinade

2 or 3 pieces of garlic, minced

2 or 3 pieces ginger, minced

2 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp oyster sauce

2 lbs fresh rice noodle

1/4 C canola oil plus additional 3 tbsp

package of bean sprouts (I forgot the bag size – will update when I get a chance)

1/4 C water

1/2 tsp sesame oil

1 tsp salt

2 tbsp soy sauce

garish with green onion slices

I found that these boneless skinless thighs at Whole Foods were a bit cheaper than at my local butcher.

Trim fat from meat and slice evenly into bite size pieces.

Place sliced meat in bowl and combine with garlic, ginger, soy sauce, and oyster sauce.  Let marinade while making pan-fried noodles.

Heat wok over high heat. Swirl in a good 1/4 c oil. Seems like a lot but you will need it. And it’s healthy for you!

Add noodles and  stir-fry for about a minute or two. Be careful not to over stir or overcook to prevent them from turning mushy and sticking to the wok. I got lazy and didn’t bother to separate the noodles before cooking. Next time I will do that. I kind of did it on the fly while the noodles were in the wok.

Set aside cooked noodles (I wanted the noodles to brown lightly but because I didn’t separate it made it slightly more difficult).

Swirl in 2 tbsp oil and heat wok over high heat. Add the marinated chicken to the wok and stir-fry until just cooked.

Set aside chicken.

Heat 1 tbsp oil in wok over high heat. Add bean sprouts and stir-fry for about 30 seconds.

Add water, cover wok for about 30  to 45 seconds.

Uncover wok and return chicken and noodles to wok.

Toss to blend well while adding salt and soy sauce to taste.

Remove to plate and serve immediately!

Kung Pao Chicken

My aunt has this awesome recipe for Kung Pao Chicken which is found in her Yan Kit’s Classic Chinese Cookbook. It’s fairly easy and quick to put together and most (if not all) of the ingredients are readily available from your local market. The key is to not overcook the chicken. Moist is what we are after.

My aunt adds a small handful of roasted peanuts at the end but I left them out.

12oz-16oz chicken breast

2 tbsp canola oil

3 to 5 fresh chilies, split in half or 2 or 3 dried red chilies.

2 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced

4 to 6 thin slices fresh ginger

1 tbsp Chinese cooking wine

2-3 green onions, cut into small rounds

Marinade

1/3 tsp salt

2 tsp light soy sauce

2 tsp Chinese cooking wine

1 tsp cornstarch

Sauce

1 tbsp dark soy sauce

1 or 2 tbsp chili sauce

2 tsp rice (or white wine) vinegar

2 tsp sugar

1 1/2 tsp cornstarch

6 tbsp chicken stock

Prepare the chicken breast. Cut into decent sized strips.

Then cut into cubes and put in a bowl.

Add salt to the chicken.

Add the Chinese cooking wine.

Add the soy sauce.

Finally add the cornstarch.

Mix well and let marinade 15-20 minutes.  If you leave it longer that’s ok. I had to wait a good hour because I had prepared everything but had to wait until we got the kids down before I could cook.

Prepare the sauce by mixing together the soy sauce, chili sauce (I used a little over 1 tbsp), rice vinegar, sugar, cornstarch and stock (I used some turkey stock I had in the fridge).

Mix all sauce ingredients together and set aside.

Cut off stem and then slice chilies lengthwise. I kept seeds and all. You might notice from the image below that I have gloves on. I learned my lesson where, one time,  I didn’t use gloves when handling chilies. A good two or three hours later I had to rub my eyes and let’s just say I’ve never been in so much pain.

Slice garlic cloves.

I forgot to take a picture of it but slice a fresh piece of ginger into 4-6 thin pieces.

Cut green onion into small rounds.

Now that everything is prepped, let’s get cooking!

Heat a wok over high heat and add a swirl or two of oil.

Add the chilies, stir and then add the garlic and ginger slices. Stir-fry a few seconds to release their aroma.

Quickly add the chicken and stir-fry for a good minute.

Splash in some extra Chinese cooking wine while stirring and tossing continuously.

Add the green onion and continue to stir-fry for a minute or so. The chicken should be almost done.

Add the well mixed sauce to the chicken and continue to stir while it thickens. Turn down the heat a bit if bubbles too fast. If you’ve added too much cornstarch it may become too thick very quickly.

The sauce should coat the chicken nicely.

Transfer chicken to a serving plate and serve immediately.

The chicken was  moist and had a real kick to it from the chilies and chili sauce. Just the way I wanted it. Next time I may play around with the level of spiciness but otherwise wouldn’t change a thing.