Lemongrass Ginger Beef Lettuce Bowls

This Asian inspired lettuce bowl is the perfect weeknight dinner. It comes together quickly and the flavors are insanely good.

I came up with this dish after I had some tenderloin tips left from a huge beef tenderloin meal I had made. The tenderloin tips are tender and they absorb the marinate to perfection.

The marinate brings so much flavor to the dish that everything else remains very simple. Soy sauce, sriracha, honey, sesame oil, rice vinegar and ponzu sauce flavor the meat beautifully. Seared quickly and sprinkled with sesame seeds, this beef is addictive. My girls were eating it like popcorn!

The rice noodles are the perfect treat in this bowl. They are cooked and sautéed in the same pan where the meat was cooked. They pick up the flavor of the beef and the color as well. It’s like noodles playing dress up 😉

Cucumbers, shredded carrots, cilantro, scallions and butter lettuce are the perfect veggies to pair with the very flavorful beef. I keep them simple and don’t even dress them in any sauce as the beef pretty much brings in all the components of sauce, salt and even spice. However, a splash of lemon juice over the veggies will bring a perfect brightness and balance over the soy marinated beef.

This meal can be eaten as a salad or you can eat as a lettuce wraps. If you decide on eating it as wraps, I recommend using 2 lettuce leaves per wrap to help hold all the fixings in place.

How I made this Lemon Grass Ginger Beef Lettuce Bowls:

Let’s start by making the marinate for the beef.

In a large bowl, add the grated ginger, lemongrass, sesame oil, soy sauce, ponzu sauce, sriracha, honey, and rice wine vinegar. Whisk all the condiments well.

Cut the beef tenderloins into cubes.

Trim the excess fat off of the tenderloin tips.

Cut the tips going with the grain (lengthwise) like in long strips. Follow by cutting the long strips against the grain to get cube like pieces. See GiF below:

Tip! Cutting the beef this way will help it remain tender.

Add the cubed beef into the marinate. Mix well to get all the bits coated in the soy mixture.

Let the beef sit in the marinate for at least 15 minutes.

While the beef is marinating, it’s the perfect time to prep the veggies.

Finely shred the carrot, slice the cucumber as thinly as possible and chop the scallions and the cilantro. Set all veggies aside.

On the stovetop, start bringing a pot of water to a boil.

At the same time, start heating some extra virgin olive oil in a medium to large sauté pan.

Once the oil is hot, add the beef to sear it. Add the beef in small batches. Cook until it is starting to brown and it is nicely seared.

Tip! Adding the beef in small batches allows it to sear nicely. If too much beef is added at once, it will steam the beef instead of browning.

As the beef is being cooked, set the cooked bits aside on a plate to rest.

When the last batch is being cooked and the water is boiling, add the noodles and cook them for 2-3 minutes.

Once the last bit of beef has been removed from the pan and added to the plate to rest, add the noodles into the same pan where the meat was cooked. Transfer them directly from the boiling water to the pan.

Sauté the noodles in the pan and add the juices released by the resting beef. This will add color and so much flavor to the noodles!

Tip! Adding the noodles directly from the boiling water to the pan without draining allows them to remain moist.

Sprinkle sesame seeds to the cooked beef.

Add the lettuce, cucumbers, shredded carrots, scallions, cilantro, noodles and beef into a bowl. If desired, add some lime juice to the veggies to dress them up a bit.

This meal can also be eaten as lettuce wraps. It is a fun way of eating this meal and creating each wrap to each persons liking. If eating as lettuce wraps, use 2-3 leaves of butter lettuce per wrap. This helps keep the wrap sturdy enough to hold the toppings.