Las Vegas Chinatown Beef

April 6, 2025

This is not exactly a recipe from Chinatown, as much as it is a recipe inspired by Chinatown. It's just another variation on the stir fry method. The Mrs. and I went and ate at Xiao Long Dumplings fairly recently (last week if I remember correctly). She also picked me up some Shaoxing Wine and Dark Soy Sauce from the International Marketplace.

So, this is the result of left-over ingredients, a vague idea of what I was going to make for dinner, trying to recapture and/or conjure the flavors from our dim sum experience.

Spicy beef in a rich, dark sauce with some veggies seemed like the right vessel to carry those flavors. I should've thrown some edamame in there, and if I were to make it again, I'd want some mushrooms in it.

Ingredients

Half Pound of ground beef (80/20 or 70/30).
One bundle of green onions.
Half a white onion.
Half of a small red cabbage.
Two Jalapeños.
Four to six fresh cloves of garlic.
Fresh peeled ginger, equal volume to your garlic.
A splash of Shaoxing Wine.
A couple table spoons of Soy Sauce.
A couple table spoons of Dark Soy Sauce.
A couple table spoons of oyster sauce.
½ tea spoon of ground white pepper.
Salt to taste.

Some notes on substitutions.

It should be noted that dark soy sauce is different from light Soy sauce, and light soy sauce is considered “regular” soy sauce in America. Dark might not be available everywhere. Its an ingredient that my wife and I go out of our way to pick up. It also stores in the fridge forever, I don't think it ever goes bad. But, if you can't get dark soy, you could dissolve a small spoon full of Marmite in warm water. You want it relatively thick still, enough to coat the back of a spoon.

There is no substitution for Shaoxing Wine. It just has a unique taste that I've never replicated using other liquids like rice wine vinegar or apple cider vinegar... Most chefs will say that it's really just about the acid, and most people can't tell the different between those ingredients in the end product, but I disagree. Some ingredients just make a world of difference. And this one is a relatively cheap ingredient to get. Order it on Amazon if you have to. I would say to get the one with the red label, but most of them have red labels. The one that our market carries is “Qian Hu” brand.

Some notes on kitchen equipment.

You should own a wok. A flat bottom one is fine. A pre-seasoned one is fine... But seasoning one yourself is relatively easy if you have a few hours on a Sunday to go through the process. What you're doing is you're polymerizing an oil (with the highest smoke point you can find) to the surface of the cooking vessel, which translates to the “non-stick” experience that you have with good cookware. Honestly, weight might be the biggest factor for you personally. You want to make sure that it can take high heat, and is easy to move around so that you can toss the contents of the vessel while you're cooking.

There are special wok spatulas and ladles that you can buy. I prefer to cook with mostly wooden utensils. You can probably get away with using grandma's wooden spoon, so long as the shaft is thick enough to take some pressure as you maneuver it around the wok.

Directions

1. Prep your ingredients.

Wash and split your green onions. Dice your white onion. Add the whites of the green onions to that pile.

Mince or fine dice your ginger and garlic. Group these together.

Cut cabbage into quarter inch square or rectangle shreds.

Slice jalapeños into thin rounds. Group the cabbage and jalapeños together.

2. Cook the beef, and get it crispy, but not burnt.

Get your wok ready. Over high heat, add enough canola oil to coat, drop your ground beef in, and break it up. Let it brown. This will take at least 5-10 minutes. Be sure to stir the ground beef around every couple of minutes so you can judge the texture and color as it cooks.

Once the beer if done, splash it with some Shaoxing Wine. Don't turn it into beef soup. Let the alcohol cook off (this only takes 30 seconds or so), then lower the heat to medium.

3. Add your aromatics.

Add white onion and the green onion bottoms. Let these cook, stirring occasionally until the onion just barely start to turn translucent (about 2-3 minutes).

Add the garlic and ginger, incorporate and let cook until fragrant (1-2 minutes).

4. Add the veggies.

Turn the heat up again to high, add the cabbage and jalapeños. Stir aggressively, get some of the wok hei going. Cook until the cabbage is tender, but still has some body and bite.

5. Make the sauce.

Turn the heat back down to medium. Pour in two or three circumnavigations around your wok worth of soy sauce. Make sure it slides down the sides and you can hear it sizzle. Stir all the ingredients and get them coated in the soy sauce.

Tap a few dabs of oyster sauce from the bottle. Stir all the ingredients and get them coated in the oyster sauce.

Lastly, add your dark soy sauce. Mix and let simmer on medium-low heat for a couple of minutes just to let the flavors combine.

6. Finish.

Serve over white rice. Garnish with the tops of your green onions.