Satay Beef Noodle Soup. Chewy rice noodles with tender satay beef in a simple broth. These homemade soup noodles are so delicious and truly hit the spot!
Jump to:
What is Satay Beef Noodle Soup?
Satay Beef Noodle Soup is a classic Hong-Kong style café noodle dish that I absolutely adore! It features tender, nutty, savory beef over bouncy rice noodles in a simple seasoned stock.
It's often served as a main dish for brunch or lunch at your local HK-style cafés (aka "cha-cha-tengs" in Cantonese). These soup noodles also works well for dinner and it's super comforting to eat on a cold winter day!
HK cafés are known to serve Western dishes with a Chinese flare as Hong Kong was colonized by Britain. So you will often see these cafés serve classic dishes like: Baked Pork Chop on Rice, French Toast, or Fish Filet on Cream Sauce Pasta.
Everytime I visit one of these cafés, this dish is my favorite thing to order! It's so satisfying that I knew I had to recreate this dish at home. So I adapted this recipe from my Chinese Style Satay Beef where the satay sauce is made from scratch.
Expert Tips
- Use a high-power blender or food processor to blend your satay sauce into a smooth texture. If you don't have one, no worries, just finely mince the lemongrass, shallots and garlic.
- Use a non-stick pan or a well-seasoned wok to fry your beef so clean up is easy!
- Do not fully cook the beef before adding the sauce, only cook it until 75% cooked and then add the sauce. Otherwise it'll overcook.
- Rinse the boiled noodles under cold water to keep them chewy and springy.
Ingredients
Please scroll down to below recipe card for exact measurements.
- Vermicelli Rice Noodles: the very thin kind and these usually come dried.
- Flank Steak: or substitute with sirloin tip steak, tri-tip steak, hanger steak, top round steak. Flank steak is the best cut of beef for this type of dish.
- Chicken broth or beef broth: low-sodium
- Regular soy sauce: or substitute with low sodium soy sauce or light soy sauce. If you’re gluten-free, substitute with tamari sauce, coconut aminos or a gluten-free soy sauce of your choice.
- Oyster sauce: Or substitute with vegetarian stir fry sauce. Do not confuse this with Hoisin sauce, which looks similar.
- Sesame oil
- Neutral oil: like avocado oil, sunflower oil, peanut oil, vegetable oil or canola oil with a high smoke point. Avoid olive oil or any heavy scented oils with a low smoke point.
Beef Marinade
- Baking Soda: do not skip this makes the beef very tender!
- Regular Soy Sauce
- Cornstarch: do not skip as this holds in the moisture in the beef
- Garlic powder
- Cold water
- Garlic
Satay Sauce
- Smooth Peanut Butter
- Ginger powder
- Fresh Lemongrass: only use the white part and not the green stems or the harder parts
- Sesame oil
- Brown Sugar
- Shallot
- Regular soy sauce
- Garlic
- Red chili: avoid using bird's eye chili as these are too spicy
Note: Most Asian grocery stores will carry most of the Asian specific ingredients.
How to Make Satay Beef Noodle Soup
- Slice flank steak against the grain on a 45-degree angle into ¼-inch thin strips. Transfer beef strips to a large bowl. Tip: to thinly cut the beef easily, freeze the flank steak for 20-30 minutes fully exposed to the cold air and cut with a sharp knife.
- Add your beef marinade ingredients into the large bowl with the beef. Mix with tongs or clean hands and then pack the beef into a ball so that the marinade can soak into the meat. Set aside to marinate for 15 minutes.
- In another large bowl, combine together satay sauce ingredients as listed and mix well or if you have a blender or food processor, use this to blend the satay sauce ingredients until smooth. Set aside.
- Heat vegetable oil in a large pan on medium-heat and fry marinated beef. Fry until the edges are brown and the meat is 75% cooked, about 5 minutes.
- Then add in satay sauce and toss beef in it. Cook for 1-2 minutes until beef is cooked through and no longer red. Transfer to a plate and set aside.
- In a large pot filled with enough water, bring to a boil on medium-high heat. Boil rice vermicelli noodles for a couple of minutes loosened and softer, about 2-3 minutes. Strain immediately. Rinse noodles with cold running water and strain again. Divide your noodles into 5 bowls.
- Divide cooked satay beef and place on top of cooked noodles.
- In a large pot, combine chicken broth, oyster sauce, regular soy sauce and sesame oil. Bring to a boil on medium-high heat. Once it comes to a boil, divide and pour the soup over the noodles and enjoy hot!
Storage & Reheating
This dish is best consumed immediately as the noodles will go soggy overtime in the soup.
However, if you have leftovers, they will last up to 1-2 days stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator. I recommend storing the noodles and beef separate from the soup base. To reheat, microwave for 2-3 minutes until hot or reheat in a pot on medium-high heat until hot throughout.
Other recipes you may like!
📖 Recipe
HK Style Satay Beef Noodle Soup
Ingredients
- 17 oz rice vermicelli thin kind
- 1.10 lbs flank beef steak
- 1 teaspoon vegetable oil or any neutral oil
Soup Base:
- 7 ½ cups chicken broth unsalted (or sub with beef broth)
- 2 ½ tablespoon regular soy sauce
- 5 ½ tablespoon oyster sauce or sub with vegetarian stir fry sauce
- ½ tablespoon sesame oil
Beef marinade:
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- 4 teaspoon regular soy sauce
- 1 ½ teaspoon cornstarch or potato starch
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- 2 teaspoon water cold
- 1 clove garlic minced
Beef Satay Sauce:
- 3 tablespoon peanut butter smooth kind, do not use the crunchy kind
- 2 tablespoon lemongrass only use the white parts and finely mince it if you're not using a blender
- 3 tablespoon brown sugar
- 3 tablespoon regular soy sauce
- 2 cloves garlic finely minced if you're not using a blender
- 1 shallot peeled and finely minced if you're not using a blender
- 1 teaspoon sesame oil
- 1 teaspoon red chili pepper finely minced if you're not using a blender
- ½ teaspoon ginger powder
Instructions
- Slice flank steak against the grain on a 45-degree angle into ¼-inch thin strips. Transfer beef strips to a large bowl. Tip: to thinly cut the beef easily, freeze the flank steak for 20-30 minutes fully exposed to the cold air and cut with a sharp knife.
- Add your beef marinade ingredients into the large bowl with the beef. Mix with tongs or clean hands and then pack the beef into a ball so that the marinade can soak into the meat. Set aside to marinate for 15 minutes.
- In another large bowl, combine together satay sauce ingredients as listed and mix well or if you have a blender or food processor, use this to blend the satay sauce ingredients until smooth. Set aside.
- Heat vegetable oil in a large pan on medium-heat and fry marinated beef. Fry until the edges are brown and the meat is 75% cooked, about 5 minutes.
- Then add in satay sauce and toss beef in it. Cook for 1-2 minutes until beef is cooked through and no longer red. Transfer to a plate and set aside.
- In a large pot filled with enough water, bring to a boil on medium-high heat. Boil rice vermicelli noodles for a couple of minutes loosened and softer, about 2-3 minutes. Strain immediately. Rinse noodles with cold running water and strain again. Divide your noodles into 5 bowls.
- Divide cooked satay beef and place on top of cooked noodles.
- In a large pot, combine chicken broth, oyster sauce, regular soy sauce and sesame oil. Bring to a boil on medium-high heat. Once it comes to a boil, divide and pour the soup over the noodles and enjoy hot!
Amanda
Made it. Amazing. Will definitely make again!
christieathome
So thrilled to read this! Thank you so much for making my recipe and for leaving such a kind comment, Amanda!
Heidi | The Frugal Girls
I love how your marinade perfectly compliments the steak and really allows it to shine in this dish. YUM!
Caleb - Never Ending Journeys
This beef noodle soup looks so irresistible. I could really go for a bowl right now!