Black Pepper Beef Udon Noodles

How to make delicious, easy Black Pepper Beef Udon Noodles in just 15 minutes!

I make a lot of black pepper dishes, I love black pepper! This black pepper udon recipe is in fact, the first video I ever uploaded on YouTube.

This is a slightly modified – and might I say improved – version of that recipe because it’s quick to prepare, uses less ingredients and discounts no flavour! I mean it when I say this has been a repeat lunch favourite of mine recently!

What is Udon?

Udon is a thick Japanese noodles made from wheat flour. It has a slight chew to it, and is super satisfying to eat. It’s one of my favourite noodles!

Udon noodles are usually sold fresh, in packaged blocks or squares. There are dry versions available as well. I prefer the fresh ones since they do not need a pre-cooking step. That said, fresh udon noodles can and are recommended to be blanched very quickly, just to loosen it. Add the block into boiling water, and gently wiggle the block so the noodles can break free. Gently do this, since the noodles can break quite easily so you end up with chunks of noodles instead of strands! I like to use chopsticks to wiggle the noodles free.

You can add oil to the water so it loosens easier, but I prefer to gently coaxing it with my chopsticks.

For this recipe, I added the block straight into the sauce, since it is liquid enough to boil the noodles along.

What Type of Beef to Use?

Use whatever beef you have in the fridge! In my initial video, I had strips of flank which I marinated for extra tenderness and flavour.

This recipe calls for thinly sliced shabu shabu beef which do not need marination AND cooks in a jiff! It’s my hack for quick beef dishes.

The Black Pepper Sauce

I used my Black Pepper Beef sauce recipe, which requires just three ingredients! It’s my favourite black pepper sauce recipe ever because it hits so many flavours with the least amount of ingredients.

The main ingredients for the sauce base are:

• Dark Sweet Soy Sauce or Kicap Manis: This not only adds salt and sugar, it gives the dish an attractive dark colour.

• Tomato Paste Concentrate: Tomato paste is so rich in taste, and I like that it does not have sugar in it. You can use tomato ketchup too – double the portion to match the flavour of the tomato paste. Tomato ketchup has sugar, so do note you might have a sweeter sauce.

• Oyster Sauce: The oyster sauce adds salt, and that extra hint of umami to the dish.

Black Pepper Beef Udon

Recipe by Sha

5.0 from 6 votes

Course: Recipes

Servings

1

servings

Prep time

5

minutes

Cooking time

10

minutes

Ingredients

• 200 g or single serve packet of Fresh Udon

• 100 grams of Shabu Shabu Beef

• 1/2 Onion

• 1 tsp Garlic, minced

• 1/2 tsp Ginger, minced (optional)

• 1/4 cup Dark Soy Sauce (or Kicap Manis)

• 1 tsp Oyster Sauce

• 1 tbsp Tomato paste

• 2 tsps Black Pepper (adjust to preference)

• 1 Cup Water

• A handful of Chye Sim (or any leafy greens)

• Cornstarch slurry of 2 tsps Cornstarch + water

Directions

• In a pan add oil, and once hot, add onions, garlic and ginger. Stir fry till fragrant.
• Add the beef slices next, and allow to cook.
• Add the dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, tomato paste and black pepper and combine with the beef. Add water to form a liquid sauce. You can combine these ingredients in a bowl beforehand for efficiency.
• Add the udon to the sauce. Gently separate the noodles in the sauce until it’s not a block. Allow the sauce to come to a boil.
• Once it boils, add leafy vegetables.
• Add the cornstarch slurry bit by bit, until sauce thickens.Serve!

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