This delicious Beef and Cabbage Chow Mein is a quick and easy weeknight meal. It has become a much loved family favourite in our house over the years!
Chow Mein is technically a Chinese noodle stir fry dish but in our household it as always been made without the noodles. Instead of noodles we add lots of shredded cabbage! You will probably say that it is not really Chow Mein if it doesn’t have noodles but what does it matter what it’s called; as long as it tastes good I say!
This Chow Mein is one of my favourite dishes to prepare because it comes together so easily. There is not a lot of vegetable prep for this one so I will normally relax and sip on a glass of wine as I cook. Shredding the cabbage is the most work required for this dish, but let’s face it, that isn’t very hard either!
The recipe is designed so that you can cook the cabbage as little or much as you like. I add it right at the end and then simmer it for a few minutes. I like it to be wilted down a bit but for the cabbage to still have a bit of crunch. Feel free to cook the cabbage more or less to your liking.
You can also adjust the amount of curry powder to suit your taste. Our family prefer mildly spiced dishes but you can add more curry if you would like a bit more heat.
This recipe makes four very generous servings but you could stretch it to 6 if you have planned appetizers and/or desserts. It also reheats very well so if you are cooking for two just put half in the fridge for later!
More Delicious Mains
Beef and Cabbage Chow Mein Recipe
- Cook Time: 35 mins
- Total Time: 35 mins
- Yield: 4 – 6
- Category: Main, Dinner
Description
This delicious Beef and Cabbage Chow Mein is a quick and easy weeknight meal. It has become a much loved family favourite in our house over the years!
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon oil
- 500g mince beef
- 2 teaspoons of beef stock powder
- 1 teaspoon of curry powder
- 1 packet of chicken noodle soup mix
- 1/2 cup of uncooked rice
- 1 cup of water
- 1/2 small cabbage, shredded
Instructions
- Heat oil in a large frying pan and brown the mince.
- Add stock powder, curry powder, chicken noodle soup, rice, and water.
- Mix well; bring to the boil and then simmer covered over a low heat for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Add the shredded cabbage and again simmer covered for around 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Serve immediately when cabbage is cooked to your liking.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 263g
- Calories: 376
- Sugar: 4g
- Sodium: 1258mg
- Fat: 10.8g
- Saturated Fat: 3.1g
- Trans Fat: 0.3g
- Carbohydrates: 37g
- Fiber: 3g
- Protein: 33g
- Cholesterol: 94mg
Hi, I'm Kaylene, and I'm a keen gardener,budding baker and wannabe DIYer!
Dont have a Clue as to how much 550g is so won’t try it!!..Sorry
Hi Pety, 500g is just over a pound or about 17 ounces if that helps. I hope you do try it because it’s delicious!
Love this recipe …. I add a cup of uncooked rice to the recipe …. delicious
Thanks for the rating Emma, we love it too and make it quite often! I’ll have to try it with extra rice next time.
Pety,
Not sure if you have tried using Google before to do conversions?
Try typing in the following either in the address bar for Chrome or in http://www.google.com:
convert 500g to lb
With that you should get clarity to what weight 500 grams is.
Hey Pety
only 3 countries in the whole world use imperial USA, Liberia, and Burma/Myanmar the remaining 192 countries use metric.
You might want to use a very easy converter easily googled you can even just type 500gm to lb and it will instantly show you.
Be a bit more open minded as your military and many other major things you would experience in your everyday life use the metric system without you realising hope this link help to broaden your views on the metric system.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrication_in_the_United_States
You won’t try a seemingly good recipe because you can’t convert 550gr? You have google, right?
Pety by name, pety by nature…
It’s a pound, not hard to convert, you can obviously access and use the internet.
Try Google an amount such as 550 grams in to the unit of measurement used in your part of the world. Easy!
Where do you get the chicken noodle soup packet?
Hi Melanie, it is just a packet of dry chicken noodle soup mix that is available in the soup isle at the supermarket. I hope this helps!
I needed to add much more water asks curry.
1/2 cabbage is tricky as my cabbage was large I really only needed 1/4 of a cup .
Otherwise just as Mum used to make it.
Glad to hear that you were able to adjust the recipe to suit your taste. My mum used to make this recipe for me too!
My sisters and I grew up eating Mum’s chow mein at least once a month and always when parties at home meant casseroles for the meal. Mum’s recipe had a couple of extra ingredients… a can of crushed pineapple in juice and a handful of sultanas that swell up when they get heated. I make this quite often and load it up with cabbage (about 3 cups) and a full packet of bean shoots that I buy from Woolies. Also I leave the rice out because I prefer more juice. The tin of pineapple also provides more liquid.
Hi Jan, this is a meal that I had often too when I was growing up. My mum sometimes added pineapple but I prefer it without! I’m one of those people that doesn’t like pineapple with savoury dishes! A recipe like this is great though because people can vary it to suit their tastes!
❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
Can u leave out the chicken noodle soup
Hi Lindee, this recipe might be a bit bland if you leave out the chicken noodle soup. You probably wouldn’t miss the noodles but you might need to add some more seasonings. Perhaps some chicken seasoning and maybe some onion powder. You could even add some dried parsley if you have it. I hope that helps!
Try the left overs drained in a strainer to make spring rolls, just need spring roll wrappers from frozen section in your supermarket ( usually found with the frozen pastry)
I’ve been making a very simular recipe for over 40 years and my kids loved it and loved the spring rolls, they make them now for their kids,
Been a big favourite in our family for many many years
What a great idea Auntyflo, I have never thought of doing this but I’m going to give it a try now! I can imagine puff pastry parcels filled with these leftovers too. Thank you very much for your suggestion!
i’ve used the left overs to make pasties as well
They sound nice too! 🙂
My mother made this recipe back in the 1960’s and she called it Kie Sie Ming. We all loved it.
Sounds like it’s been around for a while then Leonie! Certainly tasty whatever you want to call it 😉
Can you freeze the leftovers? I feel like this recipe would make too much for me to eat, and I can’t imagine my family would be big fans!
Hi Elizabeth, I haven’t tried freezing this myself but I can’t see why you couldn’t. I would expect it to keep just fine in the freezer for a couple on months in an air tight container. I hope you enjoy it!
I made this tonight, added onion, carrot and half a red capsicum. Delicious
I love the idea of adding capsicum, thanks for the suggestion Ky!
Been making this for years everyone loves it even picky eaters and you can add whatever extras you like making it for dinner tonight yummm
Yes it’s a favourite in our house too Shirley, I made it just last week!
I love this recipe. I too needed to add extra water.
Other people add mash potatoes instead of rice. Personally i like it like this recipe. I always add a little soy sauce on mine when i serve it up
Yes I’ve seen a few variations on this recipe too Lynette. Some people add extra veggies etc. I think that is the good thing about this recipe, you can change things up a bit and it still turns out delicious!
I grew up on a very similar version of this we used to call it hi li min! Don’t know if that’s how it’s spelt but we also made left overs into spring rolls
Yes, I have thought that it would make a good spring roll filling, I’ll have to give that a try one day!
This was so yum! I added a teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce, a teaspoon of soy sauce and an half teaspoon of more curry powder and more water to make sure it wasn’t too salty. Delicious!
Also used half a green cabbage and half a purple.
I’m glad you enjoyed it Amy, it’s one of our family favourites! The addition of Worcestershire sauce and soy sauce sounds yum too, I’ll have to give that a try!
Can you us the same recipe with chicken mince instead of beef
Hi Jeff, yes you can use chicken mince with this recipe. I have used chicken mince before and it make a great flavour variation!
Just like Nana used to make it, but she added green beans.
It’s funny, I googled chow mein and it gave me noodle recipes..I was like, that is NOT chow mein .. I meant Aussie chow mein
Yes, my Mum used to add green beans sometime too! I like it with just cabbage though!