beef and broccoli

This recipe for beef and broccoli, presented by Jet Tila when he appeared on The Kitchen, is one of the easier versions of the dish that I have made. Ree Drummond has a very tasty version of this recipe which she rather inappropriately tagged as one of her “sixteen minute meals.” As much as I love you, Ree, it’s not sixteen minutes the way you made it. I eventually combined a number of steps but kept the same ingredients and flavors.

Jet’s version is much simpler. I didn’t see a need to microwave the broccoli, which is his first step, so I didn’t. I’m sure he explained why he did that when he appeared on the show, but I don’t remember his reasoning. Other than that, I pretty much followed the recipe as laid out. The recipe involves marinating the beef in a mixture of soy sauce, sesame oil, cornstarch, and baking soda.  You make a sauce of chicken stock (I used vegetable, of course), rice wine (I used rice wine vinegar), oyster sauce, and cornstarch. That gets tossed in after the beef and broccoli have cooked in the wok. It all turned out quite well.

It was an easy and tasty meal for a Friday. Oh, and I pulled out the wok for the first time in a long time to make this. I haven’t given my wok enough love in recent months.