Stir Frying Away!

A few months ago Melissa asked me what cuisine I wanted to learn more about. Deep down I'm a pasta and bread girl but I feel like good Italian food is very accessible for the home cook. The two things I randomly crave but I have clue about are Asian and Mexican. I love a good stir fry from China Town, spicy peanut sauces from Thai places and nothing beats a good enchilada or quesadilla. So here it goes: Wicket, The General and I got busy in the kitchen tonight.

I'm pretty happy with how my first attempt at stir frying went. I decided to stick with veggies because the whole thing is rather intimidating without meat so the simpler the better. I picked out some of my favorite veggies: mushrooms, pepper, baby bok choy, broccoli and a little bit of leftover shallot. I found a recipe for a basic stir fry sauce and augmented it with a few ingredients from a szechuan sauce recipe: white pepper, red pepper flakes and a good squirt of sriracha sauce. My favorite was when you would get a bite with a ginger chunk in it. Yum!

Brown Garlic Sauce

(adapted from food.com)

I used this recipe more as a guideline for ingredients and directions, not for proportions.

Ingredients:
2/3 cup soy sauce (add slowly, to taste)
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/3 cup rice wine or dry sherry
3 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1/4 teaspoon white pepper
2 tablespoons cooking oil
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 tablespoon minced ginger
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/4 cup water
Directions:
1. In a bowl, combine soy sauce, broth, rice wine, sugar, sesame oil and white pepper.
2. Dissolve the cornstarch in 1/4 cup water.
3. Heat a pan over high heat; add the cooking oil, swirling to coat; add the garlic and ginger; cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 15 seconds.
4. Add the soy sauce mixture; bring to a boil.
5. Reduce heat to medium and cook for 1 minute.
6. Add the cornstarch solution and cook, stirring, until the sauce boils and thickens.

For the stir fry I heated up the pan and oil, swirled it around, tossed in my veggies and bam! Stir frying away! Right at the end you're suppose to add the sauce or else it can burn.  I also had fun grinding up the white pepper and red pepper flakes with my mortar and pestle. 

Mr. Lawyer approved and cleaned his plate!