Make Your Own StirFry! (Yum Yum)

So you feel like making your own stirfry? Awesome. You know how people always say silly stuff like “Make some stir fry! It’s easy and quick.” Well I got news for you, uhhhh---that you more than likely already knew--- *Wink * Yeah it’s easy but will it taste good, now that’s the question!

So having already sang praises for the delightful book of cross country Asian eats from Mrs. Charmaine Solomon (“The Complete Asian Cookbook”), I felt like using what I had left around in the fridge for a cheap meal, so I just decided to find a couple recipes and take a little from each.

We shall unlock the stir fry mysteries!!!!!

Here's what I used:

Honey

Sriratcha (Rooster Sauce)

Soy Sauce

Sesame Oil

Peanut Oil (for frying)

Corn starch and a little H2O

Snap Peas

Broccoli

Green Onion

White Onion

Carrot

Ginger

Garlic

Jalapeno

Sirloin Steak

Okay so I didn’t just have steak lying around, because lets face it, I’m the poorest loser in America and meat usually constitutes a date! But I had everything else lying around so I thought what the heck, went to the store and purchased a little tiny bit of steak because I was feeling rebellious.

And! this will probably annoy you but I measured almost NOTHING. But hey isn’t that the beauty of it all! (I’ll try to estimate).

Start by smacking the crap out of your meat with a mallet. You can get a less tough cut but you’re going to pay for it, especially now that gas is once again $8 billion dollars and 5 cents a gallon. But do me a favor, get it from your farmer’s market or at least a Publix; nothing worse than purchasing old meat. I FOREVER HATE YOU KROGER.

After your done pulverizing your steak, slice it into strips or bits and season with salt and pepper at least. For best results you can take the super duper step and do this the night before so that you can marinate it in whatever seasonings and sauces you like… that would be highly scrumptious. 

You are welcome to cut up your veggies however you like. I trimmed the tough bits off of my snap peas, sliced my onion long and thin, microplained about a heaping teaspoon of ginger (because biting into a hunk of ginger can be off putting), diced my garlic, green onion, and jalapeno, chopped my broccoli into bite sizes, and “peeled” my carrot until it was no more to get those peeling thin slices!

I always use a LOT of garlic (uh, in all my meals, yep). I stared with about 5 cloves only to add more later, at least half a medium sized white onion (added another 4^th  later), at least 2 tsp’s of ginger by the end, about 4 long green onion, half a small DARK green jalapeno (hot!), maybe 2 small carrots, a crown of broccoli, and a small pile of snap peas (see picture).

This picture refused to stand upright, so tilt your head ;-) 

So I started by browning the meat. I have to say, having a wok is pretty awesome. You always wonder why people do what they do and then one day you just understand. It was high heat and quick! I also used peanut oil (just a couple teaspoons) this stuff burns at high heat so make sure you keep a window open or a vent on and control your fire so that you don’t burn the house down.

I browned my steak on many sides because I find that wholly delicious. Then I removed my meat from the wok, wiped out the wok a little but not too much, and threw in the onion slices. Once they started to sizzle and turn clear (controlling my heat) I put in the ginger, jalapeno, and garlic. I mentioned the control the heat part just a second ago because there is nothing nastier than burnt garlic. After that I added the rest of my veggies and stirred around until they were "juuust before getting to a good soft/crunch combo". You can push things out of the way so that they don’t over cook when you are using a wok. Neat huh? But, you knew that already though, Smarty.

Finally, I swirled in some sauces. First I started with a little water in a cup (maybe a third of a cup), added about a teaspoon of cornstarch and mixed it with a spoon. Depending on how much food you have you may need to adjust this. I know this description is broad but I found that just using your eyeballs to adjust is easiest because once you start adding other sauces you may need to thicken more or thin it out!

Make a well in the center of the work pushing the veggies away. Pour that cornstarch and water mix into the well and let it heat so that it thickens. Add in generous swirls of soy sauce and a teaspoon or three of honey (you can use brown sugar here too, the honey was just in my face so that’s what I used). You only want to use about a teaspoon of sesame oil (that we can measure!) especially if it’s the dark stuff. If you have the nicer light stuff you can use that more liberally… it tastes better anyway!

After this cooks a little mix it in with the veggies and put the meat back in the pan. Mix it all up. I found that even after doing all of this it needed more flavor so I just went to town adding more honey, soy sauce, and a little sriratcha to get the sweet/spicy/tang effect going. Not too much though it’s hot. If you just put a little and then add more when you’re ready to eat you can control the heat to your liking.

Finally, I decided to use some Lo Mein I’d gotten about a thousand years ago from a restaurant supplier store and never used simply because I forgot it was there. Followed the directions on the pack. Mixed it in with my stirfry (now off the fire and taste tested) and then ate up with pure joy and happiness.

Main things I realized about stir fry? It’s usually about a couple things: cornstarch, lubricating sauces, addy-inny sauces ---after the fact, and lots of onion, garlic, and ginger. (the wok helps too) Soooooo.....

Eat uP!