The Chinese takeout restaurant, Rebbeca’s Chinese Takeaway & Sit In, based in Scotland, is facing controversy due to customer reactions about the foods shown in the videos made by Rebbeca Cheuk herself. But have you ever wondered how it tastes? The dark gravy shown in various videos put on many different items from the menu is the most controversial of all. Some call this gravy sauce “crude oil” or “tar” because of the dark color and thickness of this sauce.

People on the internet have poked fun at Cheuk’s food for its looks and sometimes ask which part of China some of the food on her menu originates from. More specifically, people mostly ask about her lemon chicken and her famous “crude oil”- looking gravy. The lemon chicken dish is a thick translucent sauce on top of some fried chicken which many people find weird. Cheuk will film content of her deep frying different foods, such as chocolate santas, or chocolate covered strawberries as seasonal/limited menu items.

A few items the gravy sauce has been on are: fries, rice, chicken, etc. You may wonder what this sauce could be made of, what’s in it? Being curious on what this sauce could taste like, I’ve decided to try to remake this gravy sauce and try it on a singular food – french fries. 

Making the gravy:

Since this gravy sauce has no specific or official recipe, I’ll be using a recipe similar to it, as it won’t be possible for me to try the actual thing. Crediting a creator named Chin Taylor for sharing his recipe on TikTok. I’ll be using: celery, leek, onions, carrots, garlic, star anise, bay leaves, cloves, and vegetable oil, for the base. Then after, using: flour, sugar, MSG, salt, dark soy sauce, then the special ingredient, gravy browning. The gravy browning gives the gravy that dark tar-like color.

To start, put all of the vegetables, herbs, and vegetable oil into a pot, let everything cook until cooked/crunchy, then strain the liquid from the solid, this will be used as the base. Put the base into a bowl then add flour. To complete the process, use a bit of the base to another pot and add the rest of the ingredients. Then serve with a plate of fries or your desired dish.

When I had finished it came out a bit clumpy, I used too much flour causing a different texture from the desired effect. I also used too much water, causing the flavors to be diluted. You could still taste the gravy side of it, but it was more subtle than I expected.

I didn’t know what to look for when making it, but I did my best to follow the recipe by Chin Taylor. As someone who doesn’t really eat or use gravy, this recipe would probably be pretty good, I’d have to say a 7/10 though because my version doesn’t seem to be the same, it does taste like a general gravy flavor, though it could’ve been more flavorful from the vegetables and spices/sauces. Though some of the ingredients were hard to obtain, I’d say it was somewhat worth it. In comparison to the gravy sauce in Cheuk’s videos, they look pretty similar in the recipe video, not mine though. To say it was good or bad can differ from person to person, but it’s definitely a recipe to try. So now that you know how to make a recipe similar to Rebbeca’s Chinese Takeaway & Sit In gravy sauce, “crude oil”, or “tar” you can attempt to try it too.