Mongolian Beef
Ever had a craving? The Mongolian Beef at P.F. Chang’s is definitely the stuff cravings are made of. Luckily, you can also get your fix at the local Pei Wei. What to do when you want to stay in yet crave that crisp, tender beef, sweet sauce, and just barely cooked veggies? You make this recipe.
This recipe has been around the Internet for years and you’ve probably seen it before and put it out of your mind. I mean, if it was possible to just make that delicious stuff at home, why would anyone pay to have it at a restaurant? Let me tell you, this is the real deal. Try it yourself, it isn’t hard-if it is a bit time consuming. The best part is you can tailor it to your likes and dislikes. I always find the restaurant dish a little too sweet and heavy on the sauce. At home I cut the sugar back a bit and added only as much sauce as I wanted to my dish.
P.F. Chang’s (or Pei Wei’s) Mongolian Beef
serves 4, prep 45 min, cook 10 min, adapted from KSN TV- 2 lbs flank or skirt steak
- 1/4 cup corn starch
- 2 tsp vegetable or peanut oil
- 1 tsp fresh ginger, minced
- 1 tbsp garlic, minced
- 1/2 cup low sodium soy sauce
- 1/2 cup water
- 1/2-3/4 cup dark brown sugar
- 1 cup vegetable or peanut oil
- 8 oz button mushrooms, quartered if large
- 1 bunch green onions, green part only, cut in half
- Trim all fat and silver skin from meat. Lay steaks out horizontally on the cutting board. The grain in running vertically. Make several vertical cuts to slice the slab into manageable sized pieces. Then cut the meat opposite the grain (horizontal) into two bite-sized pieces. Cut with your blade at a 45° angles to get wide diagonal slices.
- Dust steak pieces lightly in cornstarch and set aside while preparing the sauce.
- In a small sauce pan heat oil over medium high heat. Add ginger and garlic.
- Add soy sauce and water to the ginger and garlic before it browns.
- Add brown sugar and whisk until dissolved.
- Bring sauce to a boil and simmer about 10 minutes or until slightly reduced and thickened. Remove from the heat and reserve.
- In a large skillet or wok heat 1 cup oil over medium high heat.
- Working in batches, add the steak a few at a time to the hot oil. Cook about 1 minute without touching the meat then flip each piece and cook 1 minute more.
- Remove meat while still rare inside, and continue with next batch.
- Once all meat is browned, pour off oil and wipe out skillet.
- Heat skillet over high heat and add mushrooms.
- Cook without stirring a couple of minutes or until mushrooms are slightly softened and browned. Reserve.
- Add steak to the hot pan and cook about 1 minute.
- Add sauce to the pan and simmer and toss meat and sauce about 1 minute.
- Add mushrooms and green onions. Toss with steak and sauce and heat 1 minute.
- Use tongs to remove meat and veggies to a serving dish, leaving excess sauce in the pan. Serve over rice.
Be sure to use a very light dusting of cornstarch when you bread the steak pieces. If there is too much cornstarch you will get a Swiss steak texture instead of a good sear. It is still delicious but the texture won’t be the same as the restaurant dish.
This looks like a lot of steps, and it is, but it is really not hard and not even that lengthy of a process. You basically cut and bread the meat, make the sauce, fry the meat, cook the mushrooms, then toss it all in the sauce and serve. It is an especially fun dish to make for company-very impressive!
Posted in Main Dish
December 3rd, 2009 at 8:28 am
This sounds awesome. And we have no PF Changs or the pei wei (I don’t even know what that is) around our neck of the woods, but we have Hu Hot and I love their beef!
and forgive the poor grammar at beginning of sentance.
December 3rd, 2009 at 7:30 pm
My husband tried the Mongolian Beef once and wasn’t a fan, but we LOVE Mongolian Chicken from our local chinese restraunt. Any idea what the difference is besides the meat?
There shouldn’t be any difference. If you wanted to make this with chicken or shrimp you would follow the exact same steps, dust each piece lightly in cornstarch, fry briefly, then toss in the sauce to finish cooking. For chicken, I would pound it out into even, flat pieces, then cut it into bite-sized pieces. -Katie
December 3rd, 2009 at 9:05 pm
Oh I know all about those kind of cravings…I love love love PF Changs, have heard of Pei Wei but don’t have one close by. I am bookmarking this one, it looks absolutely delicious!
December 3rd, 2009 at 9:06 pm
I’m not a fan of either of those restaurants you mentioned, but your Mongolian Beef still looks good. YUM!
December 4th, 2009 at 9:03 am
This looks so good! I’ve given up Chinese food in restaurants… so much better made at home! I’ll add this to my Chinese Food folder.
December 4th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
I was a bit surprised that a gourmet such as yourself would ever be caught eating in a P.F. Chang’s.
My wife and I would most definintely NEVER eat there.
December 4th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
I love Mongolian Beef and have never really thought to make it at home. Thanks, I’ll have to try this.
December 5th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Looks wonderful. I have heard of P.F. Changs, but have never been to one. I’m not sure there are any on the East coast, but I know there are none in RI. Now I don’t have to go, I can make it at home!
December 5th, 2009 at 4:55 pm
Okay I LOVE P.F. Changs and Pei Wei. I will definately this recipe for Mongolian Beef. Thank you so much for sharing it! Besides I a SAHM of 3 kids under 6. I need a break from time to time.
PS – Are you in Wichita? We use to live in Maize.
December 6th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
I found you on foodgawker. I love mongolian beef and I am going to try your recipe with slight modification. I will drop you a link 🙂 thank you!
December 14th, 2009 at 8:54 am
Can the sauce be successfully made with less oil? 1 cup seems like a LOT.
The sauce only has 2 teaspoons of oil in it, the 1 cup of oil is for frying the meat. -Katie
December 21st, 2009 at 7:22 pm
This was pretty good here… I do think the sauce is a bit sweeter locally. Thanks for the recipe.
Hi Gary! I decreased the amount of brown sugar in the sauce to 1/2 cup because I thought it was a little too sweet. I added the original amount called for (3/4 cup) to the recipe so you can use the greater amount next time if you like! -Katie
June 22nd, 2010 at 10:45 am
We made this last night and it was really tasty! We added a can of water chestnuts at the end and they worked beautifully. Thank you for posting this.
May 17th, 2011 at 5:23 pm
we love pf changs…but rarely get to go because it is over 2.5 hrs. away!!! this was a fantastic supper!!! the entire family was asking for more~~i use 1/2 cup of brown sugar and it was just perfect!! it seemed like a lot of steps but since i have made the recipe once it will be a much faster process~~GREAT job!!!
November 9th, 2011 at 7:23 pm
I have made this twice and it is so delicious. Thank you so much for sharing!!
November 25th, 2011 at 4:46 pm
I just made this and it worked out really well. I used flap steak instead because it was on sale. Also I hate mushrooms so used green beans instead. All in all it’s absolutely delicious, and it was much easier than I thought. Thanks!
February 22nd, 2012 at 1:15 pm
I made this today after I found your recipe earlier on Pinterest this morn. It is fantastic. I think I may half the soy sauce with worcestershire and add broccolli and maybe some slice red peppers. Fabulous recipe. Thank you!
May 2nd, 2012 at 9:52 am
Chaos is exactly what my kitchen looks like every Friday…lol.
Love the recipe…great site a definite bookmark.
August 14th, 2012 at 4:31 pm
I really enjoyed the recipe, but wish there had been more of a spicy kick.
October 13th, 2012 at 6:25 am
Have you thought of using shiitake mushrooms instead of button mushrooms? Do you think that would be a good idea? I have a huge bag of dried shiitake so I’m trying to use it when I can!
By the way, found this blog by accident and it’s the best accident I’ve had in a while! Great recipes!
March 27th, 2014 at 9:11 am
This is such a gorgeous dish! I love Chinese food and can’t wait to try this recipe. Thanks 🙂
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