My favourite stir fy recipe of all time - black pepper beef!

 The reason why I am starting on this first post, it's just so it's easier reference point for me to refer to a recipe I enjoy using! 😄

So here it goes..

First attempt of stir fried black pepper beef.

I first tried cooking this dish in April, when Circuit Breaker started and there was practically no restaurants open for dine in. This had always been my go-to dish at Ichiban Sushi (an affordable causal-dining Japanese restaurant) - sizzling black pepper beef. 

So I looked up the recipe and tried my hands at it, the first one was a little too salty, so was the second. So along the way, I tweaked the ratios and the recent one just yesterday (or was it the day before) was really good! 😁

So to ease my search every single time I cook this, I’m putting it here for sharing, and also my own reference. 😆

Serves: 3 (or 2 very hungry people)

Time: 15 mins for prep (excluding marinating time), 15 mins to cook

Ingredients:

1. 200g to 250g of sliced beef (I cheated and bought the one ready for stir fry at NTUC (our local supermarket))

2. 1 small yellow pepper

3. 1 small green pepper (why not red coz whoever I cooked for does not fancy the reds 🤣)

4. 1 small round cabbage

Misc en place:

1. Marinate the beef with some corn starch (to make it smooth when cooking), some light soya sauce, sesame oil and hua diao jiu (Chinese Shaoxing wine used for cooking). I say some coz I never measure them, it’s always been by gut-feel, a very Chinese thing. 🤣

2. Sit the beef for at least 10 mins, but of course if you can sit it for a couple of hours, even better. 

3. Julienne or dice the peppers. For dicing, dice them into slightly larger cuts. Set aside.

4. Use about 5 to 6 leaves of the cabbage, rinse and slice them thinly, think Japanese Tonkatsu cabbage style. 

5. Blanch the cabbage for about 2 mins in a pot of boiling water with some salt. Set aside and cool. 

Sauce/Gravy:

1. 31/2 tablespoons of light soya sauce

2. 1 teaspoon sugar

3. 1 teaspoon corn starch

4. 5 tablespoons of water

5. A dash of Hua Diao Jiu (about a capful)

6. 11/2 tablespoons of grounded black pepper

Misc en place:

1. Mix items 1 to 5 in a bowl for prep. 

2. You can add in some grounded black pepper to the mix, but I recommend not to as it tends to stick to the bowl, rather than into the wok later. 

Cook:

1. Heat up a wok with some oil. 

2. Pour in the marinated beef and do a quick stir fry till the beef is about 70% to 80% cooked.

3. Remove the cooked beef from the wok. 

4. Using the remaing oil (if any), add in a little more, and pour in the cut peppers. 

5. Stir fry under low heat till peppers have a slight sheen to them and the skins are a little darkened/browned. 

6. Without removing the peppers from the wok, pour in the beef and do a quick fry for about 30 seconds.

7. Add in the pre-mixed sauce/gravy TABLESPOON BY TABLESPOON to prevent it from thickening too quickly. 

8. When it reaches the consistency you want, add in the grounded black pepper. (I enjoy a little more gravy with my beef, so I will add in another 2 tablespoons of water with the black pepper.)

9. Let it simmer for about 1 min.

10. Line a clean plate/bowl with the cabbage (you can pour it into the wok and do a quick stir too). 

11. Remove the cooked items from the wok and pour it over the cabbage.  

And ta-da! Dinner (or lunch) is ready!

When I can’t travel..

It’s been a crazy 2020.. Initially I wanted to use the year to document the travels from previous trips and the coming trips. Who knew that Covid-19 had other plans? 🤷🏻‍♀️

So instead of the #moleonthetoe.. It was pretty much a cooped at home working (which I have been doing since March!) and with the initial lockdown in Singapore, it was just heading out on weekends for groceries and cooking for the rest of the weekdays and the cycle continues. 

I’ve known how to cook all these years, just that I prefer eating over cooking. Such a pig eh! 😂 

Back in school, it was Food and Nutrition in the secondary school years (or high school as some know it as), and I took up the course of Hospitality in polytechnic (tiertiary) and so cooking was part of the modules I had to go through. So with the lockdown, never fear, Yix to the rescue! 

A little late in the year to start documenting down my cooking adventures, but as the saying goes, better late than never! Inspired by many homecooks, I shamelessly learnt from their recipes and tried to make them better. 🙈 

I’m definitely more active on Facebook and Instagram and I share my recipes with the photos, but it’s getting difficult to search back those, and that’s when it struck me - Foodie goes Travelling. I can’t travel this year (and probably even the next), but hey! A foodie can also be someone who cooks right? 😆 So here we go on a new adventure of cooking and good food around Singapore! ❤️

It’s been a while!

It has been a long while. 31/2 years since my last post here. 

I went for my sabbatical 3 years ago.. Visited many other places (both old and new). 

Came back from my first ever Melbourne trip a couple of days back and still wanna stay offline for a bit. 😁 The joke about Melbourne was that even before I flew out, I bought a ticket to Melbourne for 2020. 😂

You know how sometimes you just know? That gut feel and all? I went Melbourne and I love it! It’s been a while since I had such feels about a place. 

And in 2018 and 2019 I left footprints in many places. And looking back, nothing of regrets. Here’s to a great 2020 (with me surviving work).. 🤪 

Counting down to April for my first trip, May/June for my diving one, August for a quick getaway, September/October for Melbourne again, and to round up the year, December to where my love for diving started. ❤️

Let’s go!