Maggie Monday: Grad School Chinese

Maggie tells the story below about a treasured meal while in grad school. For me, as an undergrad, it was a Columbus treasure, the Kahiki. The restaurant was an ornate polynesian themed restaurant with aquariums and the “window” seats looked out on fake rainforests. That was my special place to go to when I could con a relative into taking me there. Here’s Maggie with her story…

I am moving to a new office on campus, in found some really old and funny things while packing. One of them was this recipe with a story.

When I was in graduate school at The Ohio State University in Columbus, one of my classmates and I would look forward to the occasional payday when we felt rich enough to go to China Dynasty- a wonderful and lovely (and expensive!) restaurant in the fancy Lane Avenue Mall. We dreamed about the Sesame Beef. It was so so so good.

I moved from Ohio to Virginia, and China Dynasty became even more of a dream. This was the early 1990’s, and e-mail was just coming into fashion. On a whim, I decided to e-mail the restaurant and request the recipe. Lo and behold, they sent it to me. I printed it out (I know, right?) and promptly stuck it in, of all places, my grad school file in my office. Forgotten. Since 1992. So, last week, I came across this recipe. What the heck? Let’s give it a shot.

So, here it is. The only change I made from what they sent me was to thicken and sweeten the sauce on the stove-top afterward. The sauce was quite thin, and not as sweet as  remembered, so this was my tweak. It worked very well, and was yummy. Not as crispy and flavorful as I remember, but really good, and the family gobbled it up. Next time I make it, I’ll add some crushed red pepper, or perhaps some ginger for a bit of a kick. MMMMMM. Took me back to my poor grad student days!

Sesame Beef Bulgoki

What you need:

1 lb of thinly sliced beef ( I got fresh packaged sliced stir fry beef)

marinade:

1 bunch of green onion, use mostly white part and about 1” of green, crushed fine

1 clove crushed garlic

3 t sugar

1/3 cup canola oil

2Tbs sesame oil

½ cup soy sauce

¼ cup toasted sesame, crushed

to finish sauce:

2T cornstarch

2T sugar

What you do:

Mix all marinade ingredients and marinate the beef overnight.  Place marinated beef in a foil-lined 13×9 baking pan. Broil in oven right under broiler at 500 degrees until beef is crisp on edges, about 15 minutes, turning every 5 minutes with tongs.

Remove beef from pan, reserving juices. Place pan over burner on stove-top, and whisk in cornstarch and additional sugar over medium-high heat until sauce thickens a bit. Pour over beef, and serve over steamed rice and broccoli.