Stir-fried Beef and Peppers with Black Beans

Photo by : myviaggi

A friend of mine cooked stir-fried beef last night and it was delicious. As always, she applied her tenderness into her dish: the peppers moistened with the beef juice and five spices were mouth-watering.

My five spices sitting on the shelf having been long neglected. The star anise however, are the true stars whenever I cook beef.

To cook the above, you will need (serving 2):
1/4 pound stir-fry beef, thinly sliced (mine was from the Korean grocery store ready to cook); Marinate with 1 table spoon of soy sauce, white wine or cooking wine, and half teaspoon of sesame oil; (If you'd like more beef, the amount should be just enough to coat the beef.)
1 table spoon of potato starch;
1 large sweet pepper in 1/4" sliced;
1 chili pepper thinly sliced;
1 teaspoonful of black beans (optional, available at Chinatown, or replace with salt or soy sauce to taste)
2 cloves of garlic sliced, half baby green onion Julian cut, 4 star anise (for flavouring only)
1 table spoon of soy sauce and sweet seasoning (or sugar)

HOW TO PREPARE:
* Marinate beef for 5 min. Add potato starch, fold with one hand till almost every piece is coated. I also sprinkled some roasted sesames.
* Heat olive oil lightly in a wok, add garlic, chili pepper, green onion, and star anise. When everything starts to sizzle...
* Add beef. Separate the beef pieces while frying. 1 min only then add black beans, continue to stir for about another 1 min.
* Add sliced sweet peppers. Then soy sauce, sweet seasoning (alternatively a touch of sugar).
* Stir all ingredients until well mixed for no longer than 3 min.
* Serve.

This dish gives you a mouthful of flavours of all the ingredients with occasional surprises of black beans and sesames. Just do not bite the star anise!

Don't miss my friend Zakia's recipe. She has a different approach using spices. The dish is mild, warming and homey.