Please Helen could you help us girls in Temuka how to cook tender stirfry beef as none of us have any sucess.
I use either weiner snitzel or a packet of stir fry beef from the butcher. We cook it fast wecook it slow. and again last night had a stirfry for tea and the beef was tough.
I refuse to give upand only use chicken.

Your help would be greatly appreciated.
Carol

(request emailed to Helen)

My mum went to chinese cooking classes waaaaaaaaaay back in the 80's and they told her to use skirt steak. We've always used it since and I didn't realise other people didn't until I started looking in other peoples lunches at work - I'm so nosy - and saw all these tough looking dry bits of schnitzel.
People the revolution is here!
If you look at what you get at a chinese takeaway it's almost always skirt steak. Cut it thinly across the grain - easier if it's still slightly frozen, marinate, quickly fry, take out of the pan, cook the veg and add in at the last minute to heat through. It's always moist and best of all its way cheaper than using precut stirfry meat.

Debbie
[danceswithkumara.blogspot.com]

Finally I found it, I found it, I found it!! Excuse my excitement, but I knew that in one of my books there was a method for tenderising beef. It's in my 1970s Charmaine Solomon book, and the funny thing is I have pulled it out before and my bookmark with the 'secret method' obviously had slipped. This morning I pulled it out, and my bookmark was up and standing and waving to me as proud as you please.

anyway enough of my waffle... Charmaine says that cheap cuts of lean meat can be used such as round or blade steaks, but because of short cooking times they should be tenderised by the Chinese method, which is to shred or slice the meat. Then for 500g meat dissolve 1/2 tspn of bicarb soda in 3 tbspns of hot water. Add to meat and knead well or beat with chopsticks until all liquid is absorbed. Cover & refrigerate for minumum of 2 hours, but overnight is better. Then cook as usual.

I used to use this all the time with cheap cuts and it works. The meat is melt in the mouth.

Yay, I am so pleased I found it...Thanks to the Temuka ladies for raising this and makign me do a proper search.

cheers.

Well Irene, I had heard of that method by a chinese friend and did that but used too much baking soda and it was disgusting!!!! So do it, but beware - less is more!!

Clare

I made stir fry a while ago with fillet steak as it was all I had in the freezer. Ed raved about it and said it was the best stir fried meat he had ever had. I took that to mean that the expensive tender cuts respond well to quick hot cooking.....

I marinate my Schnitzel strips in Soy, garlic, honey, sometimes Ginger and sometimes Sherry, for several hours. I dont cook it very long at all...it seems the shorter it is cooked for me the tenderer it is. I use various meats - what ever I have ( sometimes porterhouse even cut thinly into strips and its always fine.
Kiwi fruit sliced and placed on meat for a fe hours is a natural tenderiser.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/10/2008 06:24AM by Maryloo.

I use Rump steak & always marinate it.

judith

Many moooo....ns ago my Sister and I took gourmet Asian cooking classes - we learned a lot - they were great. We were taught that if you use oil in your marinade to mix the meat well with the marinade and THEN add the oil; doing it this way means the oil keeps the moisture inside the meat when cooking and the meat doesn't go watery either. But the other important factor is not to have so much marinade that the meat is swimming in it - the meat must absorb the marinade before the oil is added.

Here's the marinade we used and I still use it and is wonderful for skirt steak -

For 500 grams skirt steak (fat and sinews trimmed away, cut across grain into 5cm x 5mm strips) marinate with:

1/4 tsp sugar
1/4 tsp pepper
1/3rd tsp bicarbonate of soda
1/8th tsp salt
1/4 cup water
1/2 tsp each light and dark soy sauce
1 1/2 tablespoons cornflour

Mix this into prepared meat until the meat has absorbed all moisture, THEN add 2 tablespoons oil - stand 20 minutes before sauteing until 80% cooked.

Once the meat and whatever vegs you are using are cooked, then your main flavouring (for example an oyster sauce mixture or a sweet and sour sauce mixture) is added to meat and vegetables and thickened.

I believe bicarbonate of soda works really well as a tenderizer.
Regards,
Dawn.

I use the same method with meat for stir frying and barbecuing. Try using flank or skirt steak. Both are highly flavourable, but can be tough and stringy. The trick is to slice the meat thinly and across the grain. If you cut it at an angle you increase the size of the pieces.

Skirt steak is what I usually use for stir fry. Since fajitas are skirt steak, it's very popular here in Texas and readily available and a big plus is that fajitas come packaged already cleaned and tenderized. It's worth checking to see if your NZ grocery stores have fajitas packaged this way. It's also helpful to partially freeze the meat before slicing and then marinating the slices. Another thing, the oil must be very hot so the meat cooks quickly. I ususally pat the meat so it's not dripping before I put it in the pan, that way it doesn't "steam" as it cooks. It cooks faster and the meat stays very tender. I agree with Debbie, cook the veggies separately and then incorporate it all with your sauce...yummy!

I've been watching the fantastic BBC Chinese Food Made Easy series via download recently (it's a great series if you want to make Chinese food that's not just delicious but also healthy). In one programme, the presenter Ching-Lee Huang tenderises beef for stir-frying by whacking it with a rolling pin until it's fairly flat. I tried it with some rump steak I had in the freezer and it worked perfectly - the beef was incredibly tender. (Gladwrap the meat first if your rolling pin is made of wood.)

I'm glad you said that Carolyn. That's what my Dad always used to do to tenderise beef. This was in the days before Glad Wrap, he used to cover it with grease proof paper (or baking paper). I'm not sure how well this would work with scnitzel though because it's already quite thin, so would end up paper-thin perhaps?

Hi all,

Its good to see skirt steak being used for something other than cat food.

Sometimes I have used cross cut blade cut thinly. But most of the time I use schnitzel.
I found the best thing is not to use a dry pan.. as the schinitzel will dry and become tough.

Zeetra

Ok- Irene- I am forever in your debt. That Baking soda trick is simply amazing. Tried it last night on supermarket pack of beef stir-fry before proceeding as usual. AMAZING!!!!!
Tenderises is and gives it that distictive silky texture of cantonese stir fried meat. Not a trace of soda flavour either- I assume the lactic acid in the meat and the soda neutralize each other.

Thanks Virgil... that is what is hard to replicate, is the silky feel of the meat. I remember when I lived in Melbourne, and a Chinese restaurant told me the baking soda trick but not the measurements, then I chanced upon the measurements in Charmaine Solomons book.. now 20 something years later I finally have found it again.

And I am in your debt Virgil... the Ikea Meatballs, to die for, I have been making meatballs Romanian style and the kneading/mixing is absolutely essential, but its nice to have a recipe with different spices for a change

Cheers!!

Me too Virgil. I made them a few nights ago and the mastah loved them. I did the spicings exactly to your specifications and they were perfect. I also put the balls back in the gravy and reheated them when it was time to nosh. Found some organic carvelo nero (black cabbage) and that was perfect with them too.

I used to use the baking soda method also Irene - but overdid it one time and no-one (hungry students etc in big flat) I repeat NO-ONE would eat it!! Never game to try it again, I don't think I ever marinated it overnight (and knowing me) I probably put in another (I dunno) tablespoon for good luck!!! nope

Four legs good, two legs bad. George Orwell

Hi everyone
Just a simple question.
How do I cut across the grain?
I don't know what the grain of the meat is when I look at it.
How do I know where to start?

Looking forward to having beef in the stirfry instead of chicken.
Have fun
Ruth

Have fun!
Ruth