Cantonese Beef Stew is a dish that always popped in and out of my childhood. Sometimes it would be bubbling away in a clay pot at a Chinatown restaurant, and sometimes it was scooped out of a big pot at home. The tender, gelatinous pieces of beef and melt-in-your-mouth chunks of radish in a thin gravy, served over rice? Total comfort food. This Instant Pot Braised Beef with Radish is my shortcut pressure cooker version, with a few tweaks and improvements from the original Cantonese braised beef recipe we posted back in the early days of the blog.
Cantonese Comfort Food
My dad’s family is Cantonese, and my mom’s side of the family is from Shanghai. While my sister and I grew up eating dishes from both cuisines, my mom once asked us…if we had to choose, which would we rather have? A table filled with Shanghainese classics like braised pork belly, soup dumplings (xiao long bao), drunken chicken, and scallion oil noodles? Or a table of Cantonese classics like Salt and Pepper Pork Chops, steamed whole fish, and this braised beef with radish?
While I have a special place in my heart reserved for xiao long bao, and my sister is obsessed with scallion oil noodles, we both sheepishly turned to each other and said, back-against-the-wall, we’d choose the Cantonese table.
There’s just something particularly homey and comforting about Cantonese food, especially saucy things over rice, like this Instant Pot Braised Beef with Radish. There’s just nothing better.
Rough Flank: A Tough Cut of Meat!
Now that I’m officially an Instant Pot convert, I decided to create a pressure cooker Cantonese braised beef with radish recipe. Like my Instant Pot Curry Beef recipe, this recipe uses a cut of beef called rough flank (niu nan in Mandarin, or ngau lam in Cantonese).
It’s a pretty tough cut of meat, full of tendony, sinewy, and gristly bits that when cooked for hours, all work together to produce a delicious texture. We cut them into pretty big, 2 1/2 inch chunks, as you can see below, because they’ll shrink when cooked.
The Instant Pot helps tenderize that tough cut of meat in much less time, which is key when you’re looking for a comfort food dinner and may not have 4-6 hours to make it.
Cantonese Instant Pot Braised Beef with Radish: The Recipe
Fill your wok with cold water, and add the beef. Place over high heat, bring to a boil, and cook the beef for 1 minute to remove any impurities (see all that foam and scum in the photo below? That’s the stuff you don’t want in your stew!)
Use a slotted spoon to remove the beef to a colander, and rinse. Set aside.
Heat 2 tablespoons vegetable oil in your Instant Pot on the saute setting. Add the fresh ginger slices, and cook for 2-3 minutes, until fragrant and slightly crisped at the edges.
Add the blanched beef, Shaoxing wine, light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, 3 star anise, 5 cloves, 3 bay leaves, and 1 tablespoon sugar.
Seal the Instant Pot, make sure the valve is set to “sealing,” and turn on the meat/stew for 45 minutes. The float valve on the top of the Instant Pot will raise when under pressure.
Once finished, allow the Instant Pot to release pressure naturally. Once the Instant Pot is safe to open (pressure is fully released when the float valve has dropped back into the lid), open it up. Here’s what the stew will look like at this stage:
Next, add the radish chunks.
Stir to combine with the beef.
Replace the lid, seal the Instant Pot, move the valve back to the sealing position, and put it back on manual high pressure for 10 minutes. Once done, allow the pressure to release again using Quick Pressure Release this time (be careful moving the valve, as the steam released will be very hot. Use an oven mitt!).
Open the pot when safe. Turn on the saute setting and bring the stew to a simmer. Mix together chicken stock or water and cornstarch into a slurry and stir into the stew to thicken. Simmer for 2 minutes, season with salt to taste, and stir in the scallions.
Serve your Instant Pot braised beef with rice!
Cantonese Instant Pot Braised Beef with Radish
Ingredients
- 3 to 3 ½ lbs beef rough flank (1.5 kg, cut into 2 1/2-inch pieces)
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil (30 ml)
- 7 slices ginger
- 1 cup Shaoxing wine (240 ml)
- 3 tablespoons light soy sauce (45 ml)
- 1 tablespoon dark soy sauce (15 ml)
- 1 tablespoon oyster sauce (15 ml)
- 3 pieces star anise
- 5 cloves
- 3 bay leaves
- 1 tablespoon sugar (12g)
- 2 pounds daikon radish (1 kg, peeled and cut into 1-½ inch pieces)
- ¼ cup chicken stock or water (mixed with 2 teaspoons cornstarch)
- Salt (to taste)
- 2 scallions (cut on a diagonal into 1-inch pieces)
Instructions
- Fill your wok with cold water, and add the beef. Place over high heat, bring to a boil, and cook the beef for 1 minute to remove any impurities. Use a slotted spoon to remove the beef to a colander, and rinse. Set aside.
- Heat 2 tablespoons vegetable oil in your Instant Pot on the saute setting. Add the ginger slices, and cook for 2-3 minutes, until fragrant and slightly crisped at the edges.
- Add the blanched beef, Shaoxing wine, light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, 3 star anise, 5 cloves, 3 bay leaves, and 1 tablespoon sugar.
- Seal the Instant Pot, make sure the valve is set to “sealing,” and turn on the meat/stew for 45 minutes. The float valve on the top of the Instant Pot will raise when under pressure.
- Once finished, allow the Instant Pot to release pressure naturally. Once the Instant Pot is safe to open (pressure is fully released when the float valve has dropped back into the lid), open it and add the radish chunks. Stir to combine with the beef.
- Replace the lid, seal the Instant Pot, move the valve back to the sealing position, and put it back on manual high pressure for 10 minutes. Once done, allow the pressure to release again using Quick Pressure Release this time (be careful moving the valve, as the steam released will be very hot. Use an oven mitt!).
- Open the pot when safe. Turn on the Saute setting and bring the stew to a simmer. Mix together chicken stock or water and cornstarch into a slurry and stir into the stew to thicken. Simmer for 2 minutes, season with salt to taste, and stir in the scallions.
- Serve with rice!
nutrition facts
Is there an alternative cut of beef. I know I won’t find the called for cut anywhere around here?
Hi Frances, you can use beef chuck! It just takes less time to cook, so I would do 35 minutes on the meat/stew setting.
Followed the recipe as is. Meat was so tender and flavor was spot on. We just had it last night from a restaurant and this is just as comparable if not even better (esp when eaten fresh out of the IP). Only thing I added was carrots which worked out perfectly since my 2 year old loves carrots. I may decrease the amount of cloves and/or star anise next time only because it was a bit strong for my toddlers but they still ate it anyway. Otherwise, if not for them, I would keep everything as is. Thanks for this!
You’re welcome! Definitely feel free to back off on the spices for the kiddies. :)
This looks delicious. Can this be done without a instant pot/ pressure cooker? Thanks
Hi there, we actually have a version that does not use the Instant Pot: https://thewoksoflife.com/chinese-braised-beef-turnips/
Absolutely! Please refer to my Beef Curry for cooking time on the stove.
The texture of my meat turned out pretty good!!! However I am not sure if my cloves were just overly flavorful (but unlikely because they are 3 yrs old), but the clove flavor was super overwhelming. I would definitely cut it in half. Also I do feel like it’s missing something – I think next time when I am sautéing the ginger I will also add some garlic and fried or raw shallots for more flavor.
Thanks for your feedback, Olivia!
I tried to make this tonight, but the liquid ingredients was not enough to pressurize the pot when I tried adding the daikon. What did I do wrong?
I thought maybe my instant pot was broken, but I tested it soon afterwards with just water and it pressurized just fine.
Hi Gina, that’s strange. I’ve never heard of that happening before. Are you sure the valve was turned all the way to “sealing?” It’s usually so loose, it can be hard to miss.
We accidentally bought a pound of rough steak flank and found this recipe when googling what to make with it. Only downside was that the meat wasn’t quite done and was very hard to chew, despite simmering it for longer in the last step. Not sure why (maybe because we cut it to 1lb?) but other than that, the flavor is great! We threw in some potatoes as well and they were delish! (*Note: we did accidentally use natural release both times so that might have played into it perhaps?)
Hi Helen, I think you’re right that the 45 minutes total might not be enough to get the rough flank tender, especially if you have a particularly tough cut of meat that’s more tendon than meat. I increased the total cooking time to 55 minutes.
I can’t wait to make this….it was one my mother made and it was my favourite. She used to use chou hou sauce. Have you used that? I am trying to use what I have on hand. Thank you!
You can certainly add that here if you’d like!
How many of chou hu sauce to add? I tried to read back several page but no infomartion on that. Is 1 tbsp enough?
I always add 3 Tablespoons of Chou Hai Sauce but less soy sauce on mine.
Thanks for sharing, Helen!
Hello! Can you provide a version of this recipe without the use of an instant pot? Thank you!
Hi Janice, you can use my Beef Curry recipe as a guideline for stovetop cooking time.
Hi! In reading your recipe, you call for 5 cloves. What cloves are we talking about? Thanks!
Hi Will, cloves are a spice. Just click on our links for the ingredients in the recipe card, or inside the post whenever you are in doubt about any ingredient in the recipe. For your convenience, click here for a direct link to cloves or Ding Xiang
This has become a staple in our house. We all love it and it is very easy to make. For personal preference we add 1/2 the amount of star anise, it works for us. We also saved the ends of the Diakons and where are to get them to grow in our garden. That was a nice surprise, I hope they do well. We had never had Diakon until then and we love them and use them all the time.
Keep the great recipes coming :)
So glad you and the family are enjoying this, Gabe! I think it’s totally fair to add 1/2 the amount of star anise, as it is quite a strong flavor! :)
Nice, I have to try that. You can you can eat its greens if you don’t get daikon. I have to try that. Thank you for the idea.