Beef chow fun(pan-fried flat rice noodles) is one of my favorite Cantonese dishes. It is considered as a snack or sometimes a staple food and one of the most basic Cantonese he fun dishes. The ingredient–flat rice noodle is named as “河粉” HeFun in China. Sometimes you may find it spelled as Hor Fun, He Fen or Ho Fun. It is a kind of flat and wide rice noodles in southern china especially in Guangdong province. Either served in stir fry recipes or soup recipes. I fall I love it when I firstly had a small bowl of ho fun soup. And this stir fry ho fun with beef, onion, bean sprout and Chinese chives.It belongs to those 15 minutes that can totally win my heart.
Then for the beef chow fun, let’s take a look at the ingredients. As I am living in Guangdong province, I can purchase fresh ho fun easily at market. You can also used dried flat rice noodles and re-soak until soft before frying.
The most difficult part of this dish is to make a tender taste of the beef and make sure that you do not break the hefen during the process. After stir frying, there should be more extra sauce in the pan. That’s why this dish is called as 干炒牛河 in Chinese meaning dry fried rice noodles with beef. In order to keep the beef a tender taste, firstly after slicing, garnish some water or Chinese cooking wine with the beef and then grasp well, letting them absorb enough water and then add light soy sauce, salt, oyster sauce, and sesame oil and starch to marinade for around 15 minutes.
There are fresh rice noodles and dried ones. If you cannot find fresh ones, pre-soak the dried ones according to the instructions. Fresh wide rice noodle usually is available in package and sometimes they may stick with each other. Do separate them before frying.
Firstly heat up oil in wok and stir-fry the beef. Transfer it out as long as the color changes.
Then all the oil should be poured out,clean your pan or wok. We need a clean and dry pan for later frying process. Add oil and then add shredded onions and rice noodles to cook. Stir in stir fry sauce quickly.
Tips: do not use slice to fry the noodles, recommended tool should be chopsticks. Toss your pan with one hand and then use another hand to fold chopstickers and help turn over the rice noodles gently.
Return beef slices and add bean sprout to fry for around 30 seconds. Then add Chinese chive section or scallion to fry for another 30 seconds.
Here we are! Enjoy!
- 1/2 pound beef
- 1 pound wide rice noodle , ho fen
- 1 small bunch of Chinese chive or scallion , cut into sections around 10cm long
- 1 small bunch of bean sprouts
- 1/4 middle size white onion , shredded
- 1 tablespoon Chinese cooking wine or water
- 1 teaspoon light soy sauce
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon oyster sauce
- 1 teaspoon sesame oil
- 1 tablespoon starch
- 1/2 tablespoon light soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon dark soy sauce
- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 1/2 teaspoon sugar
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Cut beef into thin slices, put into a bowl. And then add all of ingredients for marinade sauce. Stir until well combined and set aside for around 15 minutes.
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Heat up cooking oil in wok. Add beef slices in to cook around half minute or just until the color of beef slices changes. Transfer the beef slices out and also pour the oil out. Clean your pan or wok.
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Heat up around 1 and 1/2 tablespoons cooking oil, add rice noodle and onion shreds and straight after that stir in the stir fry sauce. Keep tossing your pan or wok until the noodles are well coated with the sauce.
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Return beef slices and bean sprouts to fry for another half minutes. Keep tossing your pan.
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Add Chinese chives or scallion to fry for another 30 seconds.
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Serve hot!
I do not add salt in my stir fry sauce since my soy sauce contains salt. Do add some according to taste and the brand of soy sauce.
Newly updated recipe on Nov. 2014.
Thank for share! I really love it.
Hi Davy,
Thanks for stopping by and commenting. This is my current comfort breakfast.
Elaine, this looks great! Thank you for simplifying it. Your photography is beautiful too!
Thanks Aida for your lovely comment. Happy cooking ahead.
Raining in my mouth, looks amazing, I definitely do myself this recipe. thank you
Hi Vanessa,
Go ahead, it really worth trying. Super great for breakfast!
Hi Elaine, I’m so glad to have found your blog. I’m looking forward to trying out your recipes. Would you mind sharing which brand soy sauce you use when you use the light/dark soy sauce? What are your thoughts on kikkoman brand?
Hi Nerimaro,
I change my soy sauce brand from time to time because I am living in China and have many to choose from. I would recommend using Lee Kum Kee. Kikkoman is not a Chinese brand so I cannot give any suggestion about it. Sorry for that!
Can you take a pic of the type of soy sauce (light/dark) you use for this recipe?
Hi Jara,
I am using Lee Kum kee’s dark soy sauce and light soy sauce. I have added a link to Amazon, where you can find the pictures.
Your Beef Chow Fun looks so delicious. And thank you for the recipe. One question, is that Soy Bean Sprout that you used on this recipe? I love any kind of noodle dishes.
Yes Jenny, I use soy bean sprout in this beef chow fun. But mung bean sprout is great too.
This looks tasty and very quick too,
I’m hungry! Really hungry!
Growing up in Hawaii, my grandmother only new Oriental cuisine.
Beef Chow Fun,was my favorite dish as a child. Thanks for sharing all
your wonderful recipes with the world.
Thanks Terry for your sweet words. Beef chow fun is my husband’s favorite breakfast dish. So I make it a lot. And I am super glad that you love it too.
So glad I found your site, I still use my mother’s wok,which I inherited after she passed away. It has cooked so many great meals and now will cook many more.
what type of beef. Do I use skirt steak ?
Skirt steak is fine, Ayona.
I made this tonight for dinner, and it was amazing! I used flank steak, which I froze slightly and sliced very thin. It was melt in your mouth and full of flavor. I plan on using this recipe in my normal nightly rotation. Thank you for a delicious dish!
Hi Erin,
Thanks so much for your feedback. I love your description of this dish. It is really full of flavor. Just keep trying yummy dishes and happy cooking ahead.
I loved this recipe and also your beef chow mein. Keep the the recipes coming, yummo!
Thank you! Darryl.
This was so good! Perfect amount of flavor and easy to make. I will also be adding it in my weeknight rotation. 🙂
At last I found it–the besr and easiest chow fun recipe on the internet. Delicious and addictive! Thank you. My wife, who ix Cantonese, also loved it.
Thanks and you are the most welcome, Herman. I am glad to be helpful. Happy cooking in 2016.
Bonjour et bravo ,je voudrais savoir qu’ elle morceaux de boeuf faut acheter pour cette recette ?
Hi Martins,
You can use beef steak or beef shoulder for this recipe.
Hi
Your recipes are gonna help.me alot…your pancake…chowmein..etc.they are all amazing and easy to cook.
thumps up to your blog.??
Thank you!
I am preparing this now and I am not familiar with rice noodles and your recipie doesn’t indicate to soak the noodles for 25 min before adding to the pan with stirfry sauce sooo I added them dry….guess we’ll see if I can save this. Hopefully it turns out ok. I have made it before but used pre-prepared udon noodles and i L❤VE the flavor
Hi Pamela,
I use fresh Ho fun noodles which can be equal to fresh udon noodles. But if you are using dried ones,you need to pre-soak them until soft.
There is nothing I like more than a bowl of fresh noodles and meat. I have easy access to fresh rice noodles, and am excited to give this recipe a try. Can I ask what kind of beef your use?
Beef steak is the best ingredients.
I tried your recipe and my family loved it!!! Thank you
“…and make sure that you do not break the hefen during the process.” What does hefen refer to? The only thing I can find is that hefen is the German word for yeast.
By the way I’m going to attempt to make fun noodles from rice flower. I know it has to be steamed.
Hi John,
Hefen is the Chinese name for rice noodles.
I bought some fresh wheat noodle and I’m wondering if they can be used in this recipe.
Hi Annie,
There are several types of fresh noodles but not all of them are good for stir fry. You need to make sure that the noodles contain enough egg or lye water.
Hi Elaine,
With beef and soy bean sprouts in my fridge I was desperately looking for some recipe using those and not much else. Well I found this. And while it didn’t look as pretty as in your photos, but rather a bit brownish it sure tasted great.
I used Vietnamese rice noodles of the kind that is used for Phở or Pad Thai, because that’s what I had available. It worked quite well even though the ones you use seem to be a little bit thicker.
Thanks a lot for this recipe, I’ll make this again – with the right type of noodles if I manage to find them.
I usually have this at least twice a week! Fresh noodles are the best! Love your food site!
Glad you like it. Thanks for trying my recipes.
Tried salmon filet chunks (not thin) instead of beef. Sauté the fish gently in the marinade until slightly done.
OMIT DARK SOY SAUCE and CORN STARCH.
Do not overcook the fish.
Little or no salt necessary.
Tasty and healthful.
Thanks for sharing us with your wonderful idea. And I have correct your typo.
This was delicious! Thank you for sharing. I added Chinese broccoli to it and my kids ate it all up!
Thanks for trying the recipe and the kind feedback.
What do you mean by “garnish the beef with water and grasp tightly”?
Alex,
I meaning add some water to the beef and stir until the beef absorbs the water or rice wine. This step helps to make the beef slices juicy and tender after cooked.
Thanks for the recipe. Really appreciate it. Just made some for my class party.
You are the most welcome!
This is one of the most traditional recipies I have found. The preparing of the beef and the smell of the cooking wine reminds me of when I was a kid watching my parents cook it.
A must was to eat it with Chille Sauce, like Saracha but with out all those seasonings.
Agree with the chili sauce opinion. In my hometown, this dish is customized with chili sauces and they are quite delicious too. But cantonese version do not call any types of chili sauces.
Just got done making this recipe, and I used a dry wide rice noodle. I cooked per the package instructions (5-6 mins in boiling water and then rinse in cold water) and then added the noodles when called for in the recipe. The noodles seem really starchy and the flavor of the noodle is very bland. Also, there is no left over sauce as the write up described, The beef is great, just the noodles are off a bit. Any idea where I may have gone wrong?
Thanks
Mark,
I believe that your rice noodles are of low quality. High quality rice noodles never get starchy. Starchy noodles cannot be well flavored. So the only solution is to try noodles from another brand.
Mark,
Elaine’s dish is the dry-fried chow fun. There shouldn’t be (much) sauce left after stir-frying. I think it’s a typo in Elaine’s text. N.B. When using dry noodles you normally add some water to the stir-fry sauce. Hope this helps (after more than a year….).
Hello,
WHat kind of beef would you recommend?? Thank you
You can use slices of beef steak or beef tenderloin for this recipe.
Hi,
I am looking forward to making this tonight. My husband loves noodles!
One question, do you soak the noodles first to soften them or do they go in the pan as is? I have had trouble in the past with rice noodles and getting them to soften.
Thank you!
Allie
Sorry, I just saw all the other similar questions.
Allie,
I use fresh ho fun noodles, so there is no need to soak it. If you use dried noodles, follow the instructions on the package.
I love this dish. Ask the Chef to throw some shrimp in it as well – YUM!
I just tried this. Really good :). Glad to finally know how to make Beef Chow Fun!
Thanks for sharing the recipe <3
You are the most welcome! Thanks for the great feedback.
Isnt 1lb of noodles too much for two people
I will use dry rice noodles and 1lb is 500 grams
I think 1/2 lb would be correct would it not ?
You’re right. 1/2 lb dry noodles = approx. 1 lb fresh noodles.
I made this for dinner tonight ! Really delicious! Thank you for recipe..!
Glad to know you like this one. Happy cooking.
Hello Elaine, are the rice noodles the same as those used in Vietnamese pho? Where I live I found noodles made with rice flour and water, there are 3,5 and 10 millimeters. Can I use these noodles? What size do you recommend?
Thanks for these good Chinese recipes!
Ruth,
They are similar but slightly different in texture. This one is much softer and thinner.
Mmm I do not think I find Chinese noodles, could I try to use those noodles or better try another dish?
Sure, you can try with Vietnamese rice noodles.
Best recipe! A must try!
Just wondering what temperature your cooking the noodles.
Thank you.
Cheryl,
I cannot figure out the actual temperature during stir frying.