台湾红烧牛肉面

Hi Ethan.

Just watched the video on the Taiwan beef noodles…its awesome! It’s one of my comfort food and will definitely going to try it. Looking forward to more awesome recipes from you.

Regards

Charles Lim

Hey Ethan,

Thanks sooo much for this recipe, it’s such a lovely comfort dish! I tried it out and am soo happy with how it turned out!

I’m looking forward to learning more of these traditional recipes that remind me of my grandma !! ?

This entry seems to follow trends toward the romanticizing ethnic food by emphasizing the quality of the ingredients, with the observation that “the quality of the soup all depends on the quality of the meat.” The quality of beef in Taiwan when this dish became popular was not in fact very good (think beef from water-buffalo that outlived their usefulness as plow animals). Indeed, red-cooked beef noodles owed its popularity, as an inexpensive and filling meal for common people, to the way in which it could transform low quality or lesser cuts of beef into a tender and tasty meal. (Something that is true of beet stews the world over). Even so many people saved money by asking for red-cooked beef noodle “soup”–which used the broth without any actual beef added–and still very good. The secret to good “hongshao niurou mian” is the spices for flavor and the long braising to make the beef tender. The other significant feature of these noodles as I recall then was that they were “hot” (peppery). This recipe seems to have been altered (to suit Western tastes?) by removing the heat. This heat should come from “hot bean paste (ladoubanjiang)” (not in place of but in addition to regular black bean paste). This should be substituted for the tomato sauce in this recipe–which seems an odd non-traditional addition. But the main point again is that wonderful results do not require top quality beef.