Heya....
I know a couple of you here are pros. I'm sure you've had the Butter Beef at Phnom Penh numerous times now. I'm hoping you'll be able to help crack the recipe for Phnom Penh's butter beef. I'd rather bounce some ideas off you guys before I walk blindly into my kitchen and create some sort of monstrosity. I've done it before. We had to order in pizza.
Here's what I know so far.
- Beef (tenderloin?), it seems fairly low in fat content. Partially cooked
- Cilantro. Rough chop.
- Garlic. Chopped. Fried till crispy, but not bitter.
- Sauce, it's sweet, salty and sour at the same time. It's thicker than water, but
- Sweet - plain white sugar?
- Salty - dark soy sauce and fish sauce?
- Sour - it doesn't taste like citrus to me, I'm thinking straight up white vinegar? But lime juice is also a very real possibility.
Something weirds me out though. The beef isn't evenly cooked. Sometimes, there's a ring of raw beef on top outside the cooked beef which rings more raw beef.
Uneven
I know this is kind of ludicrous for me to say... But I have this very weird suspicion that it's being stuck in the microwave.?!?!?
Anyways, I've never really done a beef carpaccio before. Is there anything I'll need to keep in mind? Special treatment to keep the meat soft? Food safety? I'd be getting it from my local butcher (Supreme Meats, not a supermarket), but even then, the meat might not be 100% perfect.