A Sichuan dry-fried beef strip — lean beef cut into fingers, simmered with spices, then slow-fried until the moisture is driven off and the meat is dark, dense and chewy, finished with chili and Sichuan peppercorn. Unlike the wafer-thin Lantern Shadow Beef, this is cut thick into chopstick-sized strips with real chew; unlike sweet Cantonese bakkwa, it is dry, oily-fragrant and numbing-hot. Eaten cold as a keeping snack and classic drinking food, it holds for days at room temperature.
Spiced dried beef belongs to Sichuan's old tradition of cold-eaten, shelf-stable meats — the same family as Dazhou's Lantern Shadow Beef and Zigong's cold-eaten beef and rabbit — born of the need to preserve meat without refrigeration by cooking out its water and sealing it in oil and spice. Where the famous Dazhou style pares the beef wafer-thin and translucent, the strip style keeps it thick and chewy. The dish is documented as common Sichuan cold-plate and snack fare across the province rather than the creation of one shop or dated to one year; mass-produced vacuum-packed versions are now sold nationwide as a snack.
The strips are cut chopstick-thick, dark brown and dry, shrunk tight from losing their water. The chew is deep and slow — resilient, holding together rather than falling apart, releasing flavor the longer you work it. There is no sauce; each strip wears a thin film of chili oil and clinging spice rather than sitting wet. The taste lands savory and faintly sweet, then the toasted heat of dried chili, then the slow tingling-numb climb of Sichuan peppercorn that settles on the lips. A prized cold drinking snack, eaten in small pieces, not gnawed off a slab.
The dish is built on dehydration in two stages. Lean beef shank, sinew trimmed, is first simmered with ginger, scallion, wine and spices — star anise, cassia, bay, tsaoko — until cooked through and seasoned, then cut along the grain into thick strips. The strips are dry-fried (干煸) in generous oil over a falling heat: started hotter to seize and brown them, then dropped low so the meat slowly gives up its remaining water without scorching. As moisture leaves, Maillard browning deepens the color and savor and oil moves into the dried muscle; cutting along the grain keeps the strips whole through the long fry. Dried chilies and Sichuan peppercorns go in once the surface water is gone, fried at a moderate oil heat until the chilies turn red-brown and aromatic but not black, releasing the toasted-pungent (糊辣) note, while the peppercorns' hydroxy-alpha-sanshool drives the tingling numbness. Cooking the water out and sealing the meat in oil is also what preserves it — low water activity plus an oil barrier limits spoilage, so it keeps for days.
Variations
The same dry-fry technique gives Zigong's cold-eaten beef and rabbit; thinner-cut, charcoal-baked beef gives Dazhou's translucent Lantern Shadow Beef — the strip style sits between them in thickness and chew. Spicing ranges from a clean mala to a fuller five-spice or a lightly sweet finish; some cooks add a spoon of sugar or fermented bean paste, others keep it austere. Two-jingtiao chilies are used for fragrance and bullet-head chilies for color; the chili is often added in two stages, part fried with the meat and part near the end. Cheaper factory jerky is steamed and hot-air dried rather than slow dry-fried, and chews tougher and flatter.
On the Palate
Where Mala Beef Jerky sits in the Chinese flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 6
How it's made
6 steps · 1 hour active + 1 hour waiting
- 110 min
Trim sinew from beef shank and cut into large chunks; blanch in boiling water with ginger and wine to remove scum.
- 245 min
Simmer the beef with ginger, scallion, Shaoxing wine, star anise, cassia, bay and tsaoko until cooked through and seasoned, then drain and cool.
- 310 min
Cut the cooled beef along the grain into thick chopstick-sized strips.
Watch outCut the cooled beef along the grain, not across — cutting with the grain keeps the thick strips whole through the long frying.
- 430 min
Dry-fry the strips in generous oil, starting hotter to brown them, then dropping the heat low and frying slowly until the meat is dark, dry and chewy.
Watch outStart the dry-fry hot to brown the strips, then drop the heat and go slow — low heat is what draws the water out without scorching; the meat should end dark, dry and chewy.
- 58 min
Push the meat aside and fry dried chilies and Sichuan peppercorns in the oil until red-brown and aromatic, then toss everything together.
- 65 min
Finish with a little sugar, sesame and sesame oil off the heat; cool completely and serve cold, or store in a sealed jar.
