Stir Frys

Citygirl1

Just been having a go at doing a stir fry. My sister in law bought me the ingredients to try, it does taste nice and is quick to do.

What kind of things do you put in stir fries and do you do them often?

bouicca21

Mine tend to involve a selection from onions, garlic, peppers, carrot, mange tout, baby sweetcorn, spinach or pak choi. If doing as a main dish I'll usually add some chopped up chicken breast and maybe some oyster or black bean sauce.

PasturesNew

I've never got into them. They seem to be a long-winded way to spray hot oil everywhere and end up with an unsatisfying pile of veggies/sprouts. I'd rather do pie and chips

I think the (rather large) woman who lived here before me liked her stir fries as there was oil splatter on the most odd of places.... the oil gets airborne in the steam etc and then lands/sets on surfaces, blinds, everywhere.

Ginmonster

You can use pretty much any veg you have in a stir fry - you don't necessarily have to buy beansprouts or Pak choi (unless you want to!). I often use finely shredded greens of any sort - Brussels sprouts are great-; celeriac; carrots; peppers; broccoli: cauliflower; butternut squash etc etc. It's a good way of getting a variety of veg in one meal. You just need to think about how long in each thing takes to cook and cut it into appropriate sized bits. You can add some nuts or seeds at the end to add crunch and protein, some cooked noodles, rice, quinoa etc. to make a more filling meal, a slosh of chili sauce or soy sauce or satay, even curry sauce if you like. It's your dinner - put what you like in it!

Re: the grease in the kitchen - anything you cook using fat in a pan will cause this unless you have an extractor fan. Unless you never use fat of any sort or only cook in the oven then it's a bit hard to avoid.

Silvertabby

A stir fry was one of the first things I cooked after we got married..

School cookery lessons tended to be cakes and sweets, so I had to to teach myself how to cook from a Good Housekeeping book. So far so good - except I thought that '2 cloves of garlic' meant '2 whole bulbs'.

We still eat stir fries, just not so garlicky !

Pollycat

Ginmonster wrote: »

You can use pretty much any veg you have in a stir fry - you don't necessarily have to buy beansprouts or Pak choi (unless you want to!). I often use finely shredded greens of any sort - Brussels sprouts are great-; celeriac; carrots; peppers; broccoli: cauliflower; butternut squash etc etc. It's a good way of getting a variety of veg in one meal. You just need to think about how long in each thing takes to cook and cut it into appropriate sized bits. You can add some nuts or seeds at the end to add crunch and protein, some cooked noodles, rice, quinoa etc. to make a more filling meal, a slosh of chili sauce or soy sauce or satay, even curry sauce if you like. It's your dinner - put what you like in it!

Re: the grease in the kitchen - anything you cook using fat in a pan will cause this unless you have an extractor fan. Unless you never use fat of any sort or only cook in the oven then it's a bit hard to avoid.

Savoy cabbage is good.
Not sure if mushrooms have already been mentioned.
Frozen peas.

jackyann

Yes, I regard them as a good way to stretch a small piece of meat or fish, or accommodate some left-overs. I don't buy expensive ingredients at all.
My usual is:
something oniony - very often a leek as it can be cut very fine lengthways (and usually cheaper than 'spring onions'),
something bright, usually a pepper sliced very thinly,
something zingy - garlic, ginger, chilli - any combination
something green - usually spinach from my deep bed,
something tasty - the meat, fish or mushrooms ( but sometimes I leave them out)
carbohydrate - usually the quick thin rice noodles from our local Chinese shop
Whatever sauce I fancy shaken in (also from little local Chinese shop)

Absolute favourite when they are 'on offer' is prawns done with ginger & chilli

Pastures - I completely disagree with you, but had to laugh at the image of your predecessor spraying oil everywhere! Sorry, though, because it can be a b*$$@r to clean - I have forgotten how awful since we got a fantastic cooker hood and extractor.

MallyGirl

I tend to do veggie stir fry for lunch quite often as I work from home and there is always something that needs eating up. Today featured onions, leek, aubergine, courgette, kale, green pepper, mushrooms. A bit of pad thai sauce and a sprinkle of powdered peanut butter this time but it might have been garlic/ginger/chilli and soy sauce. Julienne carrots, sugar snap peas or small broccoli florets often make an appearance.
If I am serving the family for dinner there will be a protein and it will be served on rice, for lunch with just me eating then I just have a bowl full as is.

THIRZAH

I often do one for my lunch using courgette noodles and any veg I happen to have in the fridge or freezer plus frozen ginger and chilli.. I like cashew nuts in mine .