jbs@hropus.UUCP (JBS) (03/18/86)
Recently, I and my wife went out for some chinese food. I had something called on the Menu: HUNAN ORANGE BEEF It was coated beef slices in a thick brown sauce with orange peels, accompanied by steamed brocolli. It was a very spicy (hot) dish. It tasted similar to something barbequed. Since that time we've been searching for recipe with no results. We came across a dish called Orange flavored Beef, but this was very sweet and not at all HOT. SO I turn to the net. If anyone has a recipe that they think is this dish Please mail me a copy. Thanks My email address is: ihnp!houxm!hropus!jbs John B. Skiendziel
macrakis@harvard.UUCP (Stavros Macrakis) (03/19/86)
jbs@hropus.UUCP (JBS) asks for a recipe for > HUNAN ORANGE BEEF: ... coated beef slices in a thick brown sauce > with orange peels, accompanied by steamed brocolli. It was a very > spicy (hot) dish. <359@hropus.UUCP> As it happens, I made this just the other night. I too have seen this often on restaurant menus, but it is not in any of my Chinese cookbooks. The following recipe was my first try, based on the usual Chinese way of cooking beef (e.g. for Beef in Oyster Sauce) and a sauce derived from Chicken with Fresh Orange Peel (from R.Delfs' Szechuan cookbook), and it turned out quite well. Spicy Orange Beef 1.5 lb beef 5 scallions 1/4 - 1/2 C soy sauce 1/2 C Chinese vinegar 1/4 C hoisin sauce (opt.) 1/4 C Chinese orange-flavored sweet vinegar (opt.) 2 Tbsp sesame oil two-three juice oranges 5 dried small hot peppers (to taste) 1" ginger cornstarch, oil, pepper (to taste) Cut the beef into slices 1/4" thick, and one-by-two inches across. Clean the scallions, keeping the green part, and cut lengthwise in four and then into 2" lengths. Mix the beef and scallions in a bowl with enough soy sauce to coat well (1/4 cup?). Let marinate at least half an hour: better, several hours. Wash the oranges and peel off the outer skin (the orange part with just a little of the white). Juice. (It is easier to juice a peeled orange than to peel a juiced orange.) Cut the orange peel into 1-inch squares. Make a fine julienne of the ginger. It is best to start by cutting across the grain. Now prepare the sauce mixture: Drain the beef mixture thoroughly. To the drained soy, add vinegar, hoisin, orange juice, and sesame oil, and a few (very fine) grindings of black pepper. Or use 1/2-3/4 cup orange-flavored vinegar and less hoisin (but do use the fresh orange juice). In a separate bowl, mix 2 tsp of cornstarch in 1/4 C water, or even better, 1/4 C orange juice. Be sure to mix thoroughly, breaking up any lumps with a spoon or finger. Now that everything is ready, you can start cooking. You will have heated a large wok or cast iron pan or steel pan until it's very hot -- hot enough to sear anything instantaneously but not hot enough to set fire to oil (this has happened to me). You will also have a warmed serving dish sitting in the oven. A powerful exhaust fan will keep you from choking on the hot pepper fumes. Swirl 1/4 C of oil into the pan, and immediately add the orange peels. Before their edges start burning, add the ginger and the hot peppers. Stir-fry. Within a few seconds, add the well-drained beef, and spread it out on the bottom of the pan. It is important to keep the pan's temperature as high as possible -- I straddle it over two gas burners and turn it from time to time. Do not stir the beef too often: let it sear, then turn it. As juices start coming out of the beef, it's best to drain them into the sauce mixture to prevent the meat from boiling rather than frying. For best results, actually, you should use much more oil (2 C) which you heat very high before the first step (even better to cook the ginger etc. separately) and then drain after this step (of course, you can reuse that oil); in this case, you don't need to worry about how much you turn, and so on. Just before the beef is fully cooked, add the sauce mixture. Stir well and cook for about 30 secs. Re-stir the cornstarch mixture and add enough to thicken the sauce without turning it to glue. Let cook another 10-20 secs. Serve immediately. Steamed bread (man tou) is the ideal starch to eat it with, but rice is good, too. I only know two uses for orange-flavored sweet Chinese vinegar: this class of recipes, and as a dipping sauce for cold meats. -s