Crispy Chilli Beef

  • 10MINS
  • 25MINS
  • Serves 4
  • 349KCAL

Here’s our slimming friendly version of Crispy Chilli Beef! A delicious fakeaway even if you are calorie counting or following a diet like Weight Watchers.

  • Dairy Free pinchofnom.com
  • Everyday Light pinchofnom.com
  • Fakeaways pinchofnom.com
Easy Peasy Crispy Chilli Beef pinchofnom.com

NutritionPer Serving

  • Calories349
  • Carbs20g
  • Protein31g
  • Fat15g
  • Saturates5.9g
  • Sugars11g

Crispy Chilli Beef - Pinch of Nom Slimming Recipes

For the full list of ingredients and comprehensive instructions, please see the recipe card at the end of this post. Before you scroll, there’s important stuff to know in the blurb!

You may ask yourself why did we come up with this Crispy Chilli Beef recipe when there are so many out there already? So let us explain. Since we started this website, we’ve been very aware of some recipes you find online not turning out as the pictures suggest. It’s a real pet peeve of ours!

We all know what it’s like. You find a recipe that looks amazing, off you pop to the supermarket to spend a small fortune on the ingredients. You gear yourself up thinking this is the recipe that will finally get you on Masterchef, then, disaster.

What you have bubbling away on your stove looks nothing like the mouth watering picture of the meal you’d set your heart on. And even worse, it tastes nothing like you expected.

So it ends up in the bin.

This is exactly the problem that a number of members on our Facebook page faced a few weeks ago with a Crispy Chilli Beef recipe. If you’re a regular Facebook user you’ll know that you see a lot of ‘recipes’ pop up in certain groups and on your timeline.

Some of them are pretty good, but sadly most of them are just spam, which will direct you to a website full of recipes that haven’t been tried or tested, and stock photos that have been passed off as the homemade version of the recipe.

The result is you waste an awful lot of time and money trying to achieve the impossible.

When you look at this recipe you may be put off slightly by the number of ingredients. Yes there are quite a few, but it’s well worth it, and we can guarantee this one tastes just as good as it looks!

What diets is this Crispy Chilli Beef recipe suitable for?

You can enjoy this Crispy Chilli Beef if you’re dairy free.

Please make sure to double or triple check all of your ingredients if you’re cooking for people with allergies.

Do you need any special ingredients to make Crispy Chilli Beef?

You will need some granulated sweetener. This is the type with the same consistency as sugar rather than the powdered type, which can leave a bitter/chemical aftertaste.

If you chose to use a powdered sweetener, then please check how it compares to sugar. In some cases you’ll need to use less, as powdered sweeteners weigh less. The type of sweetener we use has the same weight and sweetness as sugar so you can substitute for the real stuff if you wish.

We use Franks Red Hot Wings sauce in this recipe which is available in many supermarkets. However, you could always substitute for another hot sauce like Tabasco or Sriracha if that’s all you have.

Hints & Tips

Below we added some of our communities most common hints and tips. We hope you find them useful.

Go easy on the egg and flour so it stays crispy
1
Favourite fakeaway
We switched the beef for chicken strips and lightly coated them in flour absolutely banging!!
2
Crispy Chilli Beef & Salt & Pepper Chips
Cooked beef in the airfryer which made it more crispier than oven.
Delicious 🤤
I pan fried fillet steak with light oil spray instead of crisping up rump steak. Also added some extra veg that needed using. A family fave in our house, between myself & my husband, we have lost 2 stone in weight using pinch of nom! Best books 🙌🏼
Crispy Chilli Beef
I started prepping before realising I had no eggs so coated the beef in flour only & airfried the beef until crispy - it worked really well. I also halved the ingredients for as only two of us
Use of flour
Don’t overly coat the beef in flour. Just drag it through lightly
1st time fakeaway
Use baking parchment and make sure you prepare your ingredients ahead of time
2
A family favourite, one of our Saturday night fakeaways
If you have an air fryer, coat the steak in cornflour (no egg needed) and pop on air fry for 15 minutes at 200 degrees. Keep moving it around every 5 minutes and it is amazingly crispy
Going back to my old books - forgot just how good this is
Cut the steak into really thin slices and left in the oven slightly longer. Didn't mix the beef with the sauce until on the plate ready to eat so it kept really crispy
Ingredient prep
I started to feel a bit overwhelmed as there are quite a few steps in this recipe compared to others, next time I make it I will have everything prepped and ready before staring to cook.
Soo delicious! Make sure you create to you own spice level
This was so easy to make and so tasty! I did make mine too hot! So I’ll make sure to add less chilli flakes next time. I suggest adding more or less flakes/chilli sauce to your liking. Can’t wait to make again!
Yummy crispy chilli beef
Made completely gluten free due to dietary needs. Tastes absolutely amazing and nice bit of spice 🌶 Added some rice noodles as a carb. Real hearty meal.
1
Absolutely delicious perfect for a Saturday night fakeaway
Mix the beef and cornflour and egg in a sandwich bag- less messy
Hot hot hot!
Made as part of multiple dishes for a weekend takeaway - amazing!!
I think this would work with chicken or pork if you weren't a beef fan!
Crispy Chilli ‘Not beef’
I used meat free beef style pieces to re create the PON crispy chilli beef. Tasty and satisfying!
I added a sprinkling of sesame seeds just before plating up!
Swapped out the pork for chicken breast
I added noodles to the recipe with egg fried rice and prawn crackers for the side dishes. The perfect Fakeaway!

We love hearing from you, submit any tips or tricks you have for this dish and we’ll review them and add some of them here. Just click here.

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‘Love this with salt & pepper chips and chip shop curry sauce. So easy, so quick and it’s just the same but so much better for us! We love this!’

Lorna B

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There are lots of  high quality granulated sweeteners available from the supermarket, such as Canderel Sugarly, and Natvia.

We LOVE using our wok for dishes like these. It’s great for so many Asian dishes and when you need to cook something quickly and evenly!

How many calories are in this Crispy Chilli Beef?

There are 349 calories in each portion of this Crispy Chilli Beef. This means it falls into our Special Occasion recipe category, you can find all of our other Special Occasion recipes here.

This Crispy Chilli Beef recipe fits in perfectly if you’re following a calorie controlled diet, and works well with any one of the major diet plans such as Weight Watchers.

As a guide, an average man needs around 2,500kcal (10,500kJ) a day to maintain a healthy body weight. For an average woman, that figure is around 2,000kcal (8,400kJ) a day. Obviously, if your goal is to lose weight then you might want to adjust these slightly! You can read more about these recommendations on the NHS website.

Step 1

Preheat the oven to 190-200°C.

Step 2

Season the strips of beef, then dip each one into the beaten egg, then quickly drag it through the flour to give a light coating.

Step 2 pinchofnom.com

Step 3

Place each piece of coated beef on a baking tray sprayed with a fair bit of low calorie cooking spray, then give the strips a spray too. You could even put it on a piece of baking parchment to ensure it doesn’t stick.

Step 4

Cook for 20-25 minutes, until the beef is crispy. You can turn it over towards the end if needed.

Step 5

While the beef is cooking, spray a wok with some low calorie cooking spray. Then over a medium/hot heat fry the peppers, carrots, onion, spring onion, chilli flakes, garlic and ginger.

Step 6

Cook for 5 minutes, then add the lime juice, granulated sweetener, soy sauce, rice vinegar and honey.

Step 6 pinchofnom.com

Step 7

Stir, then add a couple of drops of Franks sauce and the 100ml of beef stock.

Step 7 pinchofnom.com

Step 8

Allow to cook for a minute and then add the cooked beef strips.

Step 8 pinchofnom.com

Step 9

Stir well and serve with your choice of accompaniment.

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Whatever accompaniment you choose, don’t forget to account for the extra calories and/or other nutritional values.

How do you know when Crispy Chilli Beef is cooked?

The beef is cooked when it is crispy on the outside. This should take approx 25 minutes in an oven preheated to 190-200°C.

Standard advice here in the UK is to cook food until it has reached 70°C and stayed at that temperature for 2 minutes. This is to keep your family safe.

There are 2 things to note with this recipe is this. First, traditionally Crispy Beef is cooked in a wok with a load of oil. That’s what gives the meat that crispy texture. However, this isn’t very slimming friendly, so we bake the beef strips in the oven instead.

Whilst this does make the meat crispy, it will never be ‘quite’ as crispy as the traditional method. But if you leave it until the last minute to add it to the sauce then it will retain it’s crispiness for a bit longer.

So the secret is don’t leave the meat in the sauce for too long.

Secondly, if you prefer a bit more sauce you can add a little extra stock, soy sauce and rice vinegar.

How long can you keep Crispy Chilli Beef in the fridge?

Once you’ve put it out, ideally you should eat it within 4 hours.

If you allow any leftovers to cool, make sure to refrigerate in a container with a lid and chill.  You can keep leftovers of Crispy Chilli Beef in the fridge for approximately 3 days or so.

However, if leftovers are stored in the sauce, the beef will lose its crispy coating. We would advise setting any extra beef aside and storing separately to the sauce to prevent this.

Can I freeze Crispy Chilli Beef?

We don’t advise freezing Crispy Chilli Beef as the crispy coating will end up soggy!

How do I reheat Crispy Chilli Beef?

If you’ve stored the beef and sauce separately you can reheat the beef for around 10 minutes in an oven that has been preheated to 190-200°C. Make sure it’s piping hot before serving.

Place the sauce in a microwave proof container with loosely fitting lid and heat for 4-7 minutes until piping hot.

That being said, this dish is by far best when cooked fresh!

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Crispy Chilli Beef

Here’s our slimming friendly version of Crispy Chilli Beef! A delicious fakeaway even if you are calorie counting or following a diet like Weight Watchers.
  • Prep Time
    10 MINS
  • Cook Time
    25 MINS
  • KCals 349
  • Carbs 20G

Ingredients

  • 500 g lean rump steak cut into thin strips
  • 1 egg beaten
  • 1.5 tbsp self raising flour
  • 6 tbsp soy sauce, preferably dark
  • 2 cloves garlic finely chopped
  • 1.5 cm piece ginger peeled and finely chopped
  • 3 tbsp rice vinegar
  • 1 red pepper deseeded and sliced
  • 1/2 onion sliced
  • 5 spring onions chopped
  • 1 lime juice only
  • 1 carrot cut into thin strips
  • 2 good pinches chilli flakes or 1/2 chopped red chilli
  • 2 drops Franks Buffalo Wings Hot Sauce or another hot/chilli sauce
  • 2 tsp granulated sweetener
  • 1 tsp honey
  • 1/2 Oxo cube made up with 100ml boiling water
  • low calorie cooking spray
  • sea salt
  • freshly ground black pepper

We use a fan assisted oven for all of our recipes. Check out our oven temperature conversion guide.

Please do not screenshot this. Recipes are updated often

Instructions

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 190-200°C.
  2. Season the strips of beef, then dip each one into the beaten egg, then quickly drag it through the flour to give a light coating.
  3. Place each piece of coated beef on a baking tray sprayed with a fair bit of low calorie cooking spray, then give the strips a spray too. You could even put it on a piece of baking parchment to ensure it doesn't stick.
  4. Cook for 20-25 minutes, until the beef is crispy. You can turn it over towards the end if needed.
  5. While the beef is cooking, spray a wok with some low calorie cooking spray. Then over a medium/hot heat, fry the peppers, carrots, onion, spring onion, chilli flakes, garlic and ginger.
  6. Cook for 5 minutes, then add the lime juice, granulated sweetener, soy sauce, rice vinegar and honey.
  7. Stir, then add a couple of drops of Franks sauce and the 100ml of beef stock.
  8. Allow to cook for a minute and then add the cooked beef strips.
  9. Stir well and serve with your choice of accompaniment.

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218 comments

See what others have to say

Valerie ScottTuesday 20th February 2024

Can you use sirloin for this recipe?

Reply

    LisaMonday 26th February 2024

    Hi Valerie
    Yes, you could use sirloin, cut into strips. Enjoy

    Reply

JoMonday 3rd July 2023

I don’t have a lime will lemon juice be a good swap?

Reply

    SharonTuesday 11th July 2023

    Hi Jo, yes, you could use lemon juice instead although it will change the flavour of the dish slightly. Hope you enjoy the recipe!

    Reply

StephWednesday 9th November 2022

Could this be cooked in airfyer?

Reply

    SharonThursday 10th November 2022

    Hi Steph, we haven’t tried this ourselves but it should work well. You could cook the coated beef strips in an air fryer until crispy, then add to the sauce in step 8. Enjoy the recipe!

    Reply

      LauraFriday 7th April 2023

      I often do this in my air fryer and it’s amazing. Alternatively I do sauce on the hob and meat in air fryer

      SharonMonday 17th April 2023

      Hi Laura, thanks so much for sharing your experience of cooking this recipe in an air fryer. We’re pleased it worked so well!

Brig HillsSunday 16th October 2022

Cooked the Crispy chilli beef – OMG absolutely amazing!

Reply

    SharonMonday 17th October 2022

    Hi Brig, thanks for your lovely comment; we’re so pleased you enjoyed our Crispy Chilli Beef!

    Reply

CarrieWednesday 8th June 2022

Can I use another vinegar ?

Reply

    HollyFriday 10th June 2022

    Hey Carrie, the best swap for the rice vinegar would be white wine vinegar or apple cider vinegar, hope that helps!

    Reply

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