Made this one day after watching many YouTube videos of people eating Chinese beef noodle soups for months. I had some here in Singapore but I was mostly disappointed by the lack of beefy flavours, and well, the lack of beef.
Now I just make this at home, and eat all of its beefy goodness to my heart’s content.
This is essentially my version of the Cantonese Ngau Lam Meen, without the tendons.
Preparation time: 30 minutes
Cook time: 2 hour 45 minutes
Difficulty level: 3/5
Ingredients
1kg beef brisket, cut into cubes
600g daikon/white radish, cut into chunks
Aromatics:
1 whole cinnamon stick
3 pieces of star anise
2 bay leaves
6-7 slices of old ginger
4 garlic cloves
Sauce Mix:
2 tablespoons of taucheo (salted fermented soy beans)
1 tablespoon oyster sauce
1 1/2 tablespoon light soya sauce or to taste
1 1/2 tablespoons dark soya sauce
1 tablespoon sugar or to taste
2 tablespoon mirin/cooking wine
2 cups water with beef stock cube (omit beef stock cube if using boxed or fresh beef stock)
1 bunch of Siew Pak Choy/Bok Choy/Chye Sim
Salt and white pepper to taste
Garnish with coriander/cilantro/spring onions
Serve on noodles, with chilli oil!
Instructions
First, pat the brisket dry, and heat up your pot with some oil. Once the pot starts to smoke, place the cubed pieces of beef in for searing, season lightly with salt. Brown all sides of the beef, and remove from the pot once browned.
In the same pot, add in some oil again, and then add in the aromatics listed above. Once fragrant, place the cut up daikon in. Stir it around for 5 minutes, then add in the beef that was browned earlier.
Add in the sauces, saute and stir well, then add in the water/stock. Taste throughout the cooking process to see if there’s enough salt for your liking.
Incase anyone is wondering what taucheo is and what it generally looks like:
Let everything boil for 45 minutes, and the simmer for about 2 hours, or till the meat is super tender, then add some white pepper at the end.
Check for tenderness using a chopstick, if it goes through with minimal effort, you’re all good.
Now for the assembly! Boil water, blanch the veggies and then rinse them in tepid water. You can start boiling your noodles about the same time, or heck throw the veggies in then the noodles into the same pot, less clean up.
Put everything in a bowl, garnish, add some chilli oil and you’re ready to tuck in!
You can turn it into a thicker version by adding corn flour/potato starch slurry towards the end of the cooking process.
I personally have not made this with beef tendon, but you can add some in right when you add in your radish if you wish.
Pressure Cooker:
You can easily just throw everything into a pressure cooker/slow cooker AFTER you saute and stir fry the ingredients.
However for better flavours,I’d strongly suggest you transfer it to a pot and use the stove top for at least 30 minutes to boil.
I’ve done the method of cooking it purely in the pressure cooker and was not a fan because I found the flavours to be lacklustre as compared to when it has been boiled on the stove. There’s just some things that can’t be replicated without a good old boil over the stove, not to mention the delicious scent of food wafting through the air!
Do email me at thehantamcook@gmail.com or reach out to me @thehantamcook on Instagram if you have questions!
The Hantam Cook 