#Quick Dinners

Beef & Onion Noodles

Beef and onion noodles deliver the takeout secret in 10 minutes of cooking: the beef — any cut, even cheap — is sliced a centimeter thick and tenderized with half a teaspoon of baking soda in 80 ml of water for 15 minutes, rinsed, then marinated in mirin, soy and unagi sauce with a light cornstarch coat that seals the juices in. It sears fast in a screaming pan while two noodle cakes boil beside it, onion half-moons and green onion lengths keep some bite, and a tablespoon of oyster sauce plus two of dark soy glaze every strand. Chopsticks alone pull the beef apart. Serves 2.

35 min2 servings

EasyChinese

Golden Fried Rice with Pork Belly & Crispy Garlic Chips

Golden pork fried rice gets its color before it ever hits the wok: three egg yolks are whisked and stirred through cold cooked rice until every grain wears a thin gold coat — the technique old Chinese cooks called "gold wrap silver" — then fried on full heat until the coat turns dry and each grain falls separate. Underneath it: crispy garlic chips whose oil becomes the cooking fat, the whites scrambled into bouncy pieces (never into the rice — they turn it gummy), smoked pork belly, and soy poured around the hot rim of the wok for a caramel edge. About 15 minutes at the stove once the rice is cold. Serves 3.

30 min3 servings

EasyChinese

Egg Fried Rice

Restaurant-style egg fried rice is about removing water at every step: cook the rice with equal parts water (1 cup per 1 cup of rice), fluff it and let the steam out, drain the watery egg white through a sieve, fry the eggs first, then the rice in one thin layer on a blazing-hot pan, and run the soy sauce around the hot edge. When the rice starts to crackle, the last moisture is gone — it's frying, not steaming. About 35 minutes with the rice, serves 2.

35 min2 servings

EasyAsian

Garlic Beef Noodles

Garlic beef noodles come together in 25 minutes: stir up a sauce of chili flakes, sugar, soy, oyster and pomegranate sauce, sizzle garlic, ginger and scallions in olive oil, brown 250 g of ground beef in the sauce for about 10 minutes, then toss with freshly boiled instant noodles and a sprinkle of sesame seeds. Serves 2.

25 min2 servings

EasyChinese

Beef and Onion Stir-Fry

Tender beef and onion stir-fry starts with a baking-soda treatment, not a soda-spiked marinade: dissolve 1 tsp baking soda in 3 tbsp water, work it into 500 g of thick-sliced beef, rest 30 minutes, then rinse it out completely — that rinse is what prevents the metallic aftertaste. The beef then takes a glossy soy–oyster–cornstarch marinade and a hard sear with golden onions, scallions and garlic. A splash of plain water in the hot pan turns the cornstarch into a light glossy sauce. About an hour start to finish, serves 4.

60 min4 servings