Delicious Beef Stir fry

I've only just started to eat Chinese food recently, it's never been a cuisine that's appealed to me but I'm starting to be more adventurous and trying a few different dishes to ease me in.  Maybe it was all the greasy looking, really sweet smelling dishes that I've seen people eat from the takeaway and the number of people that have complained about getting ill after eating one! 


On Christmas Eve my mam rustled up a lovely beef stir fry in her new wok for us and it was so delicious that I had to get the recipe.  Thing is my mam just chucked some stuff in a bowl and made it up but there was a very similar recipe in the Ken Hom stir fry cookbook that Santa brought her the next day so she sent me the recipe, although I've changed it slightly.


The key here is marinating the beef before stir frying it.  The longer you can leave it to marinate the better but if you haven't got time to let the flavours soak in you can use it straight away.  Now if I had smelt the oyster sauce used in marinating the beef I don't think I would have touched it, but it does make it taste really nice.


For those of you on Weight Watchers the stir fry itself is 5 ProPoints but if you are having it with rice or noodles then it'll be extra.


The recipe below serves two but just add extra beef and veg if you are serving more.


To make the stir fry you will need:

• Steak cut into strips - I used rump steak but you could use sirloin or fillet.  I'm not sure how much steak was used as I just asked the butcher for enough for two people, but I'm guessing about 250g
• Vegetables - it's up to you what you use, this particular time I used peppers, pak choi, onion, peppers, spinach, peas, beansprouts, carrots and broccoli because that's what I had in the fridge.  Again there isn't a specific measurement for this I just cut up what I estimated to be a good amount for two people.
• 1 tbsp sweet chilli sauce - alternatively you can use a fresh chilli and a pinch of sugar
• 1 and a half tablespoons of oyster sauce
• 1 tsp of light soy sauce
• 1 large clove of garlic, grated
• 1 tsp of fresh grated ginger
• 1 tbsp of rice wine vinegar (you could use dry sherry as an alternative)
• Black pepper

1) Marinade the beef in the garlic, ginger, sweet chilli sauce, oyster sauce, rice wine vinegar and soy sauce.  Add a bit of black pepper to season.  You could add salt if you wish but I found it was salty enough with the soy sauce.  I kept mine in the fridge for a couple of hours whilst it marinated, but be warned my fridge still stinks of chilli and garlic 24 hours later!

2) When you want the stir fry, remove the beef from the fridge and let it come to room temperature.  Fry in a large pan or a wok if you have one for a few minutes on a high heat.  Once the beef is cooked you can either remove from the pan and set aside and then stir fry the vegetables in the juices left over from the beef or you can chuck it all in together, which is the method I went for! Add this stage you may also want to add more oyster, chilli or soy sauce - it's dependent on your tastes.  Again stir fry for a couple of minutes on a high heat so the veg is still crunchy.

3) Serve on its own or with some rice or noodles.  All ready in a flash!

My boyfriend calls it a Triumph!! I say its absolutely delicious..but my mam's still had the edge! :-)