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We love Asian food and this easy Mongolian beef recipe you can make right at home, most of the simple ingredients are probably in your pantry making it the perfect meal for busy weeknights. This hearty dish feeds the whole family, the meat is so melt in your mouth tender it literally falls apart.
If you make this recipe in the Instant Pot, it is ideal for busy nights where you want something with great flavor without having to put all of the time and work around it. You can have this dish done less than an hour without compromising on the flavor of the dish.
Recipe Ingredient Notes
To make our Mongolian beef recipe, you need the following ingredients:
- Flank steak
- Olive oil
- Minced garlic
- Soy sauce
- Water
- Brown sugar
- Ginger
- Cornstarch
- Green onions
- Shredded carrots
- Rice
Equipment Needed
For this recipe, you only need a few simple kitchen tools. We recommend using the following equipment:
How to Make Our Mongolian Beef
Instant Pot Instructions
- To start, get out your Instant Pot, plug it in and turn it on by pressing the SAUTE button, as well as adding in the olive oil.
- When the oil begins to sizzle, brown the strips of flank steak in the oil until all of the meat has been cooked.
- Once the meat is done, transfer it to a plate while you continue with the rest of the recipe.
- Then add the minced garlic to the oil and saute it for about a minute.
- Next, add in the soy sauce, ½ cup of water, brown sugar, and minced ginger. Stir everything in the inner pot until it is combined.
- Now, add back in the browned steak and place the lid on the Instant Pot making sure the valve is turned to the SEALING position.
- Then, press the MANUAL or PRESSURE COOK button and set the timer for 11 minutes.
- When the timer has gone off, turn the valve to the VENTING potion to do a quick release of the pressure from inside the Instant Pot.
- In a small mixing bowl, combine together the cornstarch and 3 tablespoons of water and whisk it together.
- Once the cornstarch mixture is well combined, add it to the Instant Pot, constantly stirring the sauce.
- Press the CANCEL button and then the SAUTE button and allow the sauce to come to a boil, still stirring the sauce, letting the sauce thicken.
- After the sauce has thickened, stir in the green onions and serve everything over rice and dig in!
Slow Cooker Instructions
- Spray your slow cooker with non stick cooking spray.
- Put cornstarch in a bowl and coat each piece of steak in cornstarch and place in the slow cooker. Discard any remaining cornstarch.
- Combine the remaining ingredients in a bowl and gently pour over the beef.
- Cook on high for 2-3 hours or low for 4-5 hours.
- Serve over cooked white rice, brown rice or cauliflower rice and top with sliced green onions.
Freezer Meal Modification
- Place flank steak, soy sauce, water, brown sugar, and ginger into a gallon-sized freezer bag. Place freezer bag into freezer and it will last up to 90 days.
- When ready to use, dump ingredients from bag into Instant Pot and add 1/2 cup water in with the frozen food. Place the lid on top, move the valve to SEALING, and press the MANUAL button. Set timer for 25 minutes and do a NATURAL RELEASE when the timer is done – I even like to let it sit in the Instant Pot for a few hours so that it falls apart so easily. Follow the rest of the instructions as written.
Storing and Other Tips
You can store any leftover Mongolian Beef in the fridge in an airtight container for up to 5 days
- Be sure to slice your steak into strips before cooking instead of after. It’s easier before cooking and when done cooking there is no shredding needed. It’s ready to put over cooked rice.
- We like cooking this on low setting for a tender beef. Low and slow is always the best options. But if your are short on time, the high setting works great too.
- You can cook your rice in an instant pot for a quick and delicious tasting rice.
- If you want a little heat you can add red pepper flakes to this easy recipe and top with sesame seeds.
Serving Suggestions
We recommend serving this recipe with our copycat Panda Express Super Greens, Instant Pot White Rice, and Asian-Glazed Chicken Drumsticks. You can find more Asian-inspired recipes here.
Enjoy More Delicious Beef Main Dishes
The possibilities for delicious beef main dishes are endless, from cuts of meat like steak or roast, to family-friendly ground beef dishes, explore our comprehensive collection of beef recipes.
- Grilled Ribeye Steak
- Instant Pot Ground Beef Burrito Bowls
- Instant Pot Chipotle Barbacoa
- Instant Pot Pepper Steak
- Instant Pot Steak Fajitas
- Korean BBQ Beef
- Mom’s Steak Marinade
- Oven Baked Beef Tacos
- Tangy Marinated Steak
Mongolian Beef Recipe
This multi-cooker Mongolian beef recipe is so easy to make in the slow cooker or Instant pot for a delicious weeknight meal.
Serving servings
Ingredients
- 2 pounds flank steak, cut into ¼" strips
- 1 Tablespoon olive oil
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- ½ cup soy sauce
- ½ cup water
- ⅔ cup brown sugar
- ½ teaspoon fresh ginger, minced
- 2 Tablespoon cornstarch
- 3 Tablespoon water
- 3 green onions, sliced into 1-inch pieces
Instructions
Instant Pot Instructions
- Put oil in the cooking pot and press SAUTE.
- When oil begins to sizzle, brown meat in batches until all meat is browned. Transfer Meat to plate once browned.
- Add the garlic and saute one minute. Add soy sauce, 1/2 cup water, brown sugar, and ginger. Stir to combine.
- Add browned beef, place lid on top of Instant Pot.
- Press the MANUAL or PRESSURE COOK button.
- Set timer for 11 minutes.
- When cooking is finished, move the knob to VENTING and do a QUICK RELEASE of the pressure.
- Combine the cornstarch and 3 tablespoons water, whisking until smooth. Add cornstarch mixture to the sauce in the pot, stirring constantly.
- Push the Saute button and bring to a boil, stirring constantly until sauce thickens. Stir in green onions. Serve over rice.
Slow Cooker Instructions
- Spray slow cooker with nonstick cooking spray.
- Place cornstarch in a bowl. Coat each piece of steak in cornstarch and place in slow cooker. Discard any remaining cornstarch.
- Combine remaining ingredients in a bowl and pour over beef.
- Cook on high for 2-3 hours or low for 4-5 hours.
- Serve over rice, topped with additional sliced green onions.
Notes
Slow cooker cooking times are the following: 15 minutes prep time, 4 hours cook time, and 4 hours and 15 minutes total cook time.
You can store any leftover Mongolian Beef in the fridge in an airtight container for up to 5 days
- Be sure to slice your steak into strips before cooking instead of after. It’s easier before cooking and when done cooking there is no shredding needed. It’s ready to put over cooked rice.
- We like cooking this on low setting for a tender beef. Low and slow is always the best options. But if your are short on time, the high setting works great too.
- You can cook your rice in an instant pot for a quick and delicious tasting rice.
- If you want a little heat you can add red pepper flakes to this easy recipe and top with sesame seeds.
Nutrition
Calories: 346 kcal · Carbohydrates: 28 g · Protein: 35 g · Fat: 10 g · Saturated Fat: 3 g · Cholesterol: 91 mg · Sodium: 1170 mg · Potassium: 606 mg · Fiber: 1 g · Sugar: 24 g · Vitamin A: 60 IU · Vitamin C: 1 mg · Calcium: 62 mg · Iron: 3 mg
Video
Did You Make This Recipe?We’d love to hear your thoughts! Leave a review or a question in the comment section below the post.
the recipe looks yummy, but your daughter is the real eyecatcher here! super cute!Inez
This dish looks like something my family would love! And our little girl’ s name is Taylor too:)
This dinner looks great!
your baby is adorable~ i was wondering if the 1/4c cornstarch is for coating the steak, or is it in addition in the bowl mix? thanks!
Thank you! Yes, the cornstarch is just for coating the steak. It probably wouldn’t hurt if you did throw it in the crock pot, but it’s not necessary! 🙂
Do the green onions only go in after you’ve cooked, or do some go in while cooking?
Add some of the green onions with the other ingredients while it cooks and save some for the end to add to the top of the finished recipe! Hope this helps! -The Six Sisters
Wow! The green onions look so good in the photo! I’m definitely trying this!
I made this for dinner tonight, it was amazing! I used tamari instead of soy sauce, we are gluten free. This will be added to our recipe box. 🙂
Just made this yesterday afternoon, it was the first ever crockpot recipe my husband really liked and went back for seconds and thirds, he never likes anything made in the crockpot, this recipe was delicious!!!! Definitely will make again
This dish looks heavenly! My husband is a big fan of asian recipes at home and this one is going on my menu
Made this for dinner tonight. Excellent. I will tweek it next time, tho. Low sodium soy sauce and increase the liquid somehow. It cooked down too much and started to burn. Might also cook it on low. This is going into the rotation.
Ok, so i’m ready to put the slow cooker on, but im stuck. When exactly do we put the 2 chopped babies in there?
You make it so easy to eat really well while we are at camp. I set the crock pot up with one of your amazing recipes and then go fishing for the day and come back to a ready meal.
Found this recipe on Pinterest and now it’s sitting in my crock pot making the house smell amazing…can’t wait to try it!
I just made this and followed directions to a T. The sauce on yours is dark and almost like molasses. Mine is light colored and really gummy almost. Any suggestions? I cooked mine on low.
Not sure what could have gone wrong. I’m wondering if it had something to do with the corn starch.
Loved how well the sauce thickened and the steak cooked great! I added some sesame oil to the mix and a hot peeper while cooking. But, turned out extremely salty! I used low sodium soy sauce. Do not know if I can make this again due to the salt!
Any suggestions for other kinds of beef, besides flank steak?
Can you please tell me how many this recipe serves. Thanks.
Made this last night exactly according to recipe. It was fantastic. My son and husband can’t wait to have it again. The sauce was just slightly thin, so I grabbed a ladle, put some sauce in a pot on the stove, stirring constantly, and it thickened up in seconds. After serving, sprinkled La Choy (crunchy) Chow Mein noodles on top. OMG!
4 big servings.
Any kind will work just fine.
This looks delish…… Have you ever tried this as a freezer meal ( as In freeze it before cooking and then just dumping in the crockpot and forgetting it?
Have you tried this with chicken instead of beef? I loooovvvee Pei Wei’s Mongolian Chicken and was looking for a Slow Cooker version.
We haven’t but it sounds delicious and I see no reason why it wouldn’t work. Not sure if the cooking time will change, so just watch it closely.
Question do you have cookbook published yet? If you do where can you get one? I have made lots of meals from off your site and we love them. Although the cookbook does sound grand I love that online you can see the photos of the meals you are making. Making the Mongolian beef tonight…just got done putting it in the crock pot. Thanks for the time you spend sharing with us all.
When you go to SixSistersStuff.com you will see our cookbook at the top…it will say “check out our book”. If you click on that it will take you to amazon where you can order it or read more about it. We will have a 2nd cookbook coming out in February.
Added 5 carrots (1/3rd inch thick coins) and 1 large onion (sliced eighths) to the crockpot first. Then I put in all the other ingredients (except the shredded carrot). I used chuck steaks instead of flank and sliced the large globs of fat off it. It cooked during our 3-hour Church block. Turned out nicely; all the family liked it.
Just made this (with sirloin steak, without carrots) and it’s delicious! Definitely keeping this in the dinner rotation. 🙂
Why is there a need for cornstarch?
You coat the meat in cornstarch, it also adds as a thickener in the recipe.
Holy smokes! Lip smackin’ good! I added a splash of sesame oil, used low sodium beef broth in place of the water, then added some chopped fresh broccoli during the last 30 mins of cooking. Served it up over some fresh brown rice! Yum and YUM! Had the plan to make it into a freezer meal to add to my son & DIL’s stash in prep for the new (first) grand baby coming soon. Looks like I’ll have to make another batch because the hubby and I aren’t letting loose of this one! haha
We made this for dinner again last night! It has become a favorite in our house over the last year. I just had to let you know how much we love it!
This recipe was a blast!!! I added broccoli and onions…
The entire family enjoyed second servings
Mongolian beef is my husband’s favorite Chinese dish. Tried to make it a few times but it never came out the same. Came across your recipe yesterday, it was so easy a simple. Oh my god! it was wonderful. My husband loved it. Thank you for sharing.
I made this last night – delicious!! Thanks for sharing!!
I used stir-fry beef and it was disgusting. Not even edible. I wouldn’t recommend using that. I’m upset but thanks for sharing your recipe anyway!
I am extremely sensitive to ginger….is the ginger strong in this recipe? I cant stand the taste of it unless its gingerale. Would it hurt if I left it out?
The recipe calls for 1/2 teaspoon. But you can totally leave it out if you don’t like it.
I made this recipe last night and it was awesome! I followed the recipe exactly as posted. My husband is a very picky eater and even he loved it (not easy)! Easy recipe with great results. Thanks!
Love this recipe! We are huge fans of Chinese style food. Beef flank steak is a bit on the expensive side, but every now and then it’s a tasty alternative to chicken! 🙂
Taylor is just adorable…..in Northern Ireland we would say she’s a “wee dote”!
This recipe sounds delicious- going to try it this week. Thanks for sharing!
This sounds amazing! I found a link to your recipe from a site about freezer meals. If I were to make this ahead of time and freeze it, would I just place everything in a freezer bag, then throw in the crock-pot when ready to cook? I’m new to freezer and crock-pot cooking so thanks for the help!
Hi Jennifer, Yes! Throw it all in a freezer bag and when ready to cook thaw slightly and put in the crock pot.
So exited to make this today! Quick question that hope someone sees 🙂 Do you recommend cooking on high for shorter period of time or low for longer? I’m not usually the steak cooker in the house and I want to make sure it doesn’t over-cook. 🙂 Thank you!!!
The cornstarch actually works as a thickened for the sauce!
We wanted to eat quickly so we cooked this with thin sliced roundsteak and cooked it like a stir fry. Adding: waterchestnuts, celery, onion and red pepper strips along with the carrots. We also added red chili flakes to add some heat and zip then we cut the sugar down to about 1/4 cup as we don’t care for sweet. This Mongolian beef rocks!!!! Love following your site and trying your reciepes!!
Would pre-packaged stir fry meat work for this? I am hoping because I have some at home. I am hoping since it is a crockpot recipe that it will get tender & not be as chewy as stir fry meat can get.
We haven’t used the pre-packaged stir fry meat for this recipe, but it should work just fine.
We are trying to cut back sugar and am wondering, would it be better to substitute honey, or something else, rather than brown sugar? Thoughts?
I have this in my slow cooker now! It’s dinner tonight…..I can’t express how good it smells in my house right now. Everyone is chomping at the bit ready eat! I kinda dipped a little shot glass into the “juice” a few minutes ago for a tiny sample…BOY OH BOY IS IT DELICIOUS! I’m super excited, as I do believe this recipe may actually make it seem s though I know how to cook! Thanks for this (and other) recipes. I will update you as to the family reaction after dinner. I was going to wait to post this much, but I was too excited!
I love this recipe and have made it several times. Can it be made as a crock pot freezer meal?
You could definitely make this as a freezer meal.
You made our day with your sweet comment. Hope the family enjoyed dinner!!
Hi there, any chance there is nutritional information for this recipe somewhere? I’m counting points – ugh.
The minced garlic and ginger – are these dry hens or fresh or from minced jar?
We used ground ginger from our spice rack. We like to use bottled minced garlic because it’s so easy!
What’s the sodium?
This link will give you the nutritional information on this recipe. Just scroll down. You could definitely use low sodium soy sauce to bring down the sodium.
Very good but would prefer less sugar. Too sweet. And I’d add onion and bell pepper and a little pepper
frozen or fresh broccoli?
I want to try this, looks awesome, but I have 6 people to serve and about 3 lbs flank steak. Do you think I should just double everything in a 5 qt crockpot and would it turn out well? Have you ever tried this? Thanks!
Just curious if you did double this, how it turned out? Thanks!
I made this today and doubled it – and threw it out. Way too much cornstarch and was just a gooey mess. Perhaps I did something wrong but I followed the recipe exactly, except it took slightly more cornstarch to coat the pieces of meat. Obviously I used too much.
This was AMAZING!! I need some help though 😂 I watched your video on how to do this in your Instantpot and there were no carrots in there, can you not use them for this recipe in your pot? I used strip steak, beef broth, and a sm amt of ginger powder as substitutes and this was by far better than any Chinese restaurant. Thanks for sharing this with us!!
You could easily throw some carrots in, but they get done pretty fast in the instant pot.
This was delicious! Does the calorie count include the rice?
The best and I mean best made it with short ribs.
So glad you liked the recipe! Have a terrific week.
Yes, the calorie count includes the rice.
Can you make this with Pork? I’m allergic to beef.
You could easily use pork with this.
Fantastic recipe! I did double up on the ginger, as that is a flavor we really enjoy in our home. It turned out great and was ohh so easy!
We really liked this reciepe. My sons liked it so much that we have it in our rotation. Trying is on 16yrold Grandson next week.
Ok! This recipe I thought would be more for my hubby and I. The kids tried it though and OMG! They LOVED IT! My son won’t eat anything that has “sauce” he ate it up! It was so so good! Thanks you guys!
Easy,
Delicious
When you make this to freeze, do you cook the steak first?
You can sear the meat barely on each side. Sometimes we skip that part and throw everything into the freezer bag. It’s up to you. It will work either way.
Can you use a rib eye steak instead of the flank steak.?
Rib eye should work too. Flank steak is more flavorful.
So savory and yummy!! The only thing I change is I use Low Sodium GF Soy Sauce.
OMG! Both my husband & I were craving Chinese food prior to making this dish. It was delicious! We are having the leftovers tonight! I fixed it according to the recipe & had no problems. This is a great dish! Thank you so much.
I loved this recipe and so did my family. They keep talking about it days after we eat it.
I did make some adjustments because we watch our sugar intake. I omitted the brown sugar and subbed coconut aminos for soy sauce. incredible!
I trusted you guys so without having tried this I did a double batch – one for tonight’s dinner and one for a future freezer meal. Was SO happy that I did as the trust was not unfounded. this was a great flavor! Changed nothing with the instructions!
My entire family absolutely loves this recipe and I have some skirt steak hanging out in my freezer. Do you think I could sub that in?
This is delicious. I’m trying to track calorie intake. What’s the serving size for 346 cal?
Can you make rice in the instant pot pot with this recipe
We haven’t tried cooking the rice together with this recipe in the instant pot. This article shows how you could give that a try using the pot-in-pot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYDz_hVa9uA&t=180s
What are your thoughts for using stew beef in this recipe?
We haven’t tried using stew beef but I don’t see why that wouldn’t work. Let us know how it turns out if you give it a try!
Can you prep ahead and freeze this if you keep the sauce separate?
Really want to try this recipe!! What could I use to substitute the sugar? Thanks!
Absolutely!