Ingredients

• 2 lb beef brisket or stew meat or tendon mix, trimmed of fat, cut into 1″ cubes
• 3 lb Chinese turnips, white daikon radish, or carrots; peeled, cut into 1″ cubes
• 3-5 cups chicken broth
• 3.5 oz. ginger, thickly sliced
• 5 shallots, minced
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• 3 bean curd sticks, soaked in water 2 hours and cut into 1.5″ pieces
• 10 shiitake mushrooms, reconstituted, stemmed and sliced, with liquid reserved

Aromatics

• 2 licorice slices 甘草片
• 1 tsao ko cardamon (Amomum tsaoko) 草果
• 1 dried tangerine peel
• 1 cinnamon stick (½ of it’s fresh)
• 1 star anise
• 3 dashes white pepper powder
• 2 bay leaves
• 1/3 tsp Szechuan peppercorn

Sauce

• 3.5 oz / 100g Chu Hou sauce
• 5g five-spice powder
• 2 tbsp of sugar
• 2 tbsp light soy sauce
• 100 ml shaoxing wine
• 1 tbsp dark soy sauce

1. Lightly flour the beef cubes and sear on all sides until light brown. Add to crockpot with the cubed turnip/daikon/carrot.
2. Sauté the shallots, garlic, ginger until fragrant.
3. Add the aromatics ingredients for a quick sauté.
4. Add the sauce ingredients, stir in 3 cups chicken broth. Bring to a boil.
5. Add boiling sauce to crockpot. Now add remaining boiling chicken broth to crockpot until ingredients are covered.
6. Cook for 2 hours on high. Add the bean curd sticks. Continue cooking for 4 more hours, or until beef is tender. Let sit overnight for best flavor.

For Instant Pot: add 0.5 cup of the shiitake mushroom liquid instead of 3-5 cups broth. Pressure cook beef, mushrooms, liquid, sauce and aromatics on High for 30 minutes. Remove beef. Pressure cook radish/carrots and bean curd on High for 10 minutes. Combine everything together.