Five-Spice Beef (Wuxiang Niurou, 五香牛肉)
The Mala MarketIngredients
- 2 pounds beef shanks (3–4 pieces)
- kosher salt
- ground Sichuan pepper
- ¼ cup neutral oil
- ¾ cup rock sugar
- 6 generous slices of fresh ginger
- 6 scallions, whites and light greens only, cut into 2 inch-long segments
- 3 pods (2 grams) star anise
- ~2 pieces (2 grams) cassia bark
- 1 teaspoon (2 grams) fennel seeds
- 2 teaspoons (2 grams) whole Sichuan peppercorns
- 1 scant teaspoon (1 gram) cloves
- 1 tablespoon chicken bouillon granules or paste (optional)
- 2 tablespoons Shaoxing wine
- 2 tablespoons light soy sauce
- 2 tablespoons dark soy sauce
- 2 tablespoons Chinese soybean paste (huangdou jiang) (or substitute with Pixian doubanjiang for a slightly spicier version)
Instructions
- Sprinkle the beef shanks with a generous amount of kosher salt and ground Sichuan pepper and refrigerate them, covered, for at least several hours and up to a day.
- When ready to cook, place the beef shanks in a large pot of cold water and bring it to a boil. Blanch the beef for five minutes. Drain the shanks and run them under cold water, rinsing off any scum that may be sticking to them.
- Combine the neutral oil and rock sugar in a wok and cook them on medium low. Stir vigorously as the sugar goes through different stages: first liquified but pale, then opaque and foamy, then, finally, the color of soy sauce as it fully dissolves into the oil. At this stage, the mixture will be lightly smoking, but there shouldn’t be any burning smell.
- Add the ginger and scallion, but be careful of splatter as the aromatics hit the sugar oil! Continue stirring vigorously for a minute, letting the caramelized sugar toast the ginger and scallions. Remove the pan from the heat and set it aside.
- Put the star anise, cassia bark, cloves, fennel and Sichuan peppercorns into a tea bag (or tie them into a piece of cheesecloth). To keep the braise as tidy as possible, you can scoop the ginger and scallion solids out of the sugar oil with a slotted spoon and add them into the bag as well.
- Put the blanched beef shanks into the smallest pot you can fit them into in a single layer, and barely cover them with cold water. Add chicken bouillon and bring to a boil. Skim any additional scum that comes up.
- Add the caramelized sugar and oil mixture and the teabag of spices to the pot, then add the Shaoxing wine, light and dark soy sauces and bean paste. At this point, the beef should still be fully covered with liquid. If it’s not, add water to just cover. Turn heat to low and simmer the beef, covered, for an hour and a half.
- Test for doneness with the chopstick test: Insert a chopstick into a shank and lift it out of the pot. Give it a gentle twirl just over the pot (very close to the liquid); if the beef falls off the chopstick, it is done. If it stays on the chopstick, keep simmering and check again at 15 minute intervals.
- Once it is done, let the beef shanks cool in their liquid before refrigerating them overnight (still in the braising liquid). To serve, cut the shanks crosswise into thin slices and drizzle them with a little braising liquid. Alternatively, use them as the star of a cold-dressed salad or a noodle soup.
Notes
If you don't have fermented soybean paste (huángdòu jiàng, 黄豆酱), Japanese miso or Korean doenjiang are acceptable substitutes in this recipe, since we just need the paste to help add salt, umami and depth of flavor to an already complex mixture. Pixian doubanjiang is also OK to use if you don’t mind also adding a little chili pepper, as is fermented tofu.