Simple Stir-fry System

Hi, everyone!  This is Lara Hammock from the Marble Jar channel and in today’s video, I’ll share my system for making unique and varied stir-fries with no fuss. 

So, I have this weird thing where I don’t like making the same recipe more than once. It’s one of the odder things about me, I think.  And there are QUITE a few to choose from.   But there is one thing that I make almost every week — and that is stir fry.  I can do that because when you factor in all of the different choices in vegetables, protein, and sauce — there are practically an infinite number of varieties of stir fry.  Plus, it is healthy, my family generally likes it, and it’s an all in one dish.  It’s also something that I can make on autopilot — I know the sequence of events by heart.  The only complication is making the sauce, but I have a solution for that I’ll talk about afterwards.

Oh, and even though I would love to take credit for all of this, I have to give a shout out to the good folks at Cooks Illustrated for the stir fry tips and most of my sauce recipes. Their magazine is full of the best scientifically tested cooking practices.  I love it.

Okay — first let’s cover the 4 components that make up a stirfry:

1. Veggies - pick 2 vegetables.  It doesn’t really matter which ones you choose. Some possibilities are bell peppers, mushrooms, baby corn, snow peas, zucchini, Napa cabbage, broccoli, bamboo shoots, but you can choose whatever you like in a stirfry. 
2. Protein - pick one protein.  Here are some of my favorites: tofu, chicken, shrimp, beef, pork, ground beef, or sausage. 
3. Minced fresh garlic or ginger.  In a pinch, I use prepared garlic and ginger in a tube.  Stirfry purists will not like that shortcut, but they will probably have issues with a couple of the choices I’m making here. 
4. Sauce plus Cornstarch - I have a billion sauce recipes, but usually I use one of 6 sauces from Cooks Illustrated.  More on this later. 

Now, let’s go through the steps:

• First cut up all of your ingredients into bite sized pieces.  I used bell peppers and mushrooms. 
• Next, combine the ingredients for the sauce. More on this later.
• Now, you are going to stirfry the protein in a couple of TBs of vegetable oil until it's just browned and then remove from the pan. I used chicken in this one. Stirfrying means cooking on high and stirring constantly. I like to use a large flat bottomed sauté pan rather than a wok — I think it heats everything better. 
• Okay, add a little more oil and now stir fry the veggies until they are just about done.  If you are cooking a vegetable like broccoli, which really needs to be steamed, you can either steam it in the pan by adding a little water and covering it, or just put it in the microwave for 3 minutes or so before stir frying. 
• At this point, you are going to create a well in the center of the veggies, add about a TB more of oil and a teaspoon each of minced ginger and garlic.  Sauté those in the oil in the center of the pan for just about a minute. Then mix that in with the rest of the veggies.
• Okay, now dump the protein back in.
• Now it’s time for the sauce.  Before you add in the sauce, whisk in 1 TB of cornstarch to thicken the sauce.
• Pour the sauce into the pan, and stir to combine. Let it cook for about a minute to thicken and it’s done!

The whole thing is easy, fast, and healthy.  Looks good, right?

Sauce

So, let’s talk about the sauce. I hate having to pull out all of the 6-8 ingredients for the sauce — plus i don’t have the sauce ingredients memorized, so I have to look up a recipe. This complicates my super easy, autopilot meal. So, I created a solution.

I make up 16 batches of sauces in advance, freeze them flat, and quickly thaw one right before cooking.  I make 4 each of our 2 favorite sauces and then 2 each of 4 additional specialty sauces.  It takes me about an hour to put all of the sauces together and clean up, but saves the time and mental energy on a busy cooking night. 

First I get out all of the ingredients that I need. Then I use a Sharpie to label quart sized freezer bags with the sauce names — it’s harder to do this after they are full.  I make 4 sauces at a time, so I get the bags to stand up in containers, so I can fill them easily. Then I get out all of the measuring cups and spoons in my house and go to town measuring in all of the ingredients for each sauce. I try to squeeze out as much air out as possible, seal up the bags, and freeze them flat. Once they are frozen, they can be stored vertically in the freezer, so that you can easily see the sauce names.  Because I freeze them flat, they take under a minute to thaw in a bowl of hot water.  Plus, you can mix the cornstarch in right in the bag before pouring into the stirfry.  I am including a link to the spreadsheet containing recipes for the 6 sauces I use.  

Let me know what you think!  Comments are always appreciated and thanks for watching!