Beef Stir Fry

So the other night I decided to make myself some stir fry. I know, I know. It's nothing new and why is he posting this? Well, this time I changed it up a little bit.

Ingredients:
1 lb Stir Fry Beef
1 can Cut Baby Corn
1 can Bean Sprouts
1 cup Frozen Peas
1 cup Frozen Cut Green Beans
Sesame Seeds
Spicy Brown Mustard
Sesame Seed Oil
Sweet & Sour Sauce
Stir Fry Sauce
Teriyaki Sauce
Garlic Salt
Vegetable Oil

Alright, first step of course is to assemble your ingredients.

Now I chose to cut up the stir fry meat first. You don't have to do this but you would be left with huge strips of meat instead of size appropriate pieces. Cutting them smaller solves that issue.

Using a wok, pour in a spoonful of Vegetable Oil and turn the heat to MEDIUM. Add in your cut up Stir Fry Beef. Add in a few dashes of Sesame Seed Oil.

Add in some Lime Juice, Spicy Brown Mustard, Sesame Seeds, Teriyaki Sauce, and Garlic Salt. I used a good squirt of the Lime Juice bottle. Maybe a spoonful of Spicy Brown Mustard. A dusting of Garlic Salt. Go crazy with the Teriyaki Sauce, because why not!?

Once the meat is done cooking, which should be right when it turns that grayish brown color of being cooked. Strain the meat out of the wok and place in a bowl to the side. I put mine in the microwave to retain heat better.

In your wok you still have the liquid mixture. Add in your Frozen Peas and Frozen Cut Green Beans.

Some more Spicy Brown Mustard? I think so.

Add in a good sized amount of Sweet & Sour Sauce. About the same amount of Stir Fry Sauce.

Now mix it around. Get your can of Cut Baby Corns and Bean Sprouts. Open them up and drain them of all liquid. I chose to put the Baby Corns in first, then the Bean Sprouts.

Mix them around and let them cook for awhile. You can check when they are done by tasting a piece of the Baby Corns. Once those are done, everything else should be too.

Now that it's done, you get the Stir Fry Beef out and throw that back in the wok.

Mix.

Now give it a minute or two of cooking. Turn off heat and serve. Enjoy.

Veggie Surprise!

I decided to have this last night as a healthy-ish dinner alternative to eating meat. I know it sounds weird, however too much meat isn't really the best idea ever.

Ingredients:
1 cup Frozen Corn
1 cup Frozen Peas
1 box Ditalini Pasta
1/4 cup diced Scallions
1/2 lb Green Beans
Ground Black Pepper
Italian Herb Mix
Parmesan Cheese
Sea Salt
1/4 stick Butter

I began this by gathering my ingredients.

I then started the water boiling for my Pasta. Once that began to boil, I added in my pasta. I also added a pot of water with the 2 cups of frozen vegetables as well. Heat on MEDIUM once boiling.

Now, I turned to the Green Beans. I put a saucepan on the stovetop with the Butter in it. Heat to MEDIUM. Once the Butter is mostly melted, add in your Green Beans. Mix to coat. Lightly dust with 2 pinches of Sea Salt and 3 of Ground Black Pepper. Mix again.

Now that you have everything going, step back and enjoy the satisfaction of cooking your own meal. Yes, it's nice.

Ok back to business! Make sure to mix your Green Beans up until they are done cooking. Taste test to determine. You could also tell that about the time your Pasta is done, everything else is as well.

Now I strained out the Pasta first and put it in a large mixing bowl. I then added in the Peas/Corn that I strained. I mixed this all together.

I plated that mixture and topped with the Green Beans and Scallions. A light dusting of Italian Herb Mix and Parmesan Cheese to top it all off. Enjoy.

Chef's Original: Lunch for Work!

This is a dish I threw together last week and have since repeated as it is amazing for lunch on a workday. It began as a rough idea of throwing some things together. Namely, quinoa and peas. However, this changed to include a few more ingredients.

Ingredients
1 box Small Shell Pasta
1 cup Frozen Peas
1 cup Frozen Corn
2 cup Quinoa
Sea Salt
Italian Herb Mix
Shredded Asiago Cheese

I began this by filling my deep saucepan with water for the Pasta. I then put a dash of Sea Salt in the water and turned the heat to HIGH and covered it. I also turned the heat to MEDIUM for the Peas and Corn to start them cooking.

Now I turned to the Quinoa portion of this recipe. This part is made simple by use of a Rice Cooker. If you do not have one of these, I strongly suggest investing in one to suit your needs. I measured out the 2 cups of Quinoa and put it in the Rice Cooker.

Then I put in the 2.5 cups of Water that is required. Then plug the Rice Cooker in and push the level to COOK. Now let it be. You might need to let out some steam later on though, it does tend to bubble over a little bit with Quinoa.

Now turn to your pot of water for the Pasta. It should be boiling or close to it. Add in the entire box of Small Shell Pasta. Make sure they all sink. No, I am not sure why you should do this but I do it and so should you. It's what all the cool kids do...

Now that the Pasta is cooking, you might want to turn the heat down a little bit to around MEDIUM. I added in 2 large pinches of Italian Herb Mix at this point to flavor up the pasta a little bit.

Now stir it to make sure it mixes well.

A few minutes later the Pasta should look like the following picture as it is done. Taste test to make sure.

Oh look, the vegetables are done as well so turn their heat off.

Now it's just waiting on the Rice Cooker to cook that Quinoa. Oh no! It's almost foaming over!

Just take the top off long enough for a quick picture and it dies down.

It will click off to WARM once the cooking is done. You can leave it on that, but it dries the Quinoa out so I just unplug it.

Now, strain the Pasta first using a strainer. We don't want any water in this dish. Now put the Pasta into a large mixing bowl. Strain the frozen vegetables and put them in the same mixing bowl. On top of this add the Quinoa. Then stir some life into it! Go crazy and make it consistent throughout.

Then serve! I added a sprinkle of Italian Herb Mix and pinch of Shredded Asiago Cheese to the top. Enjoy!

Stir Fry Salad

I was poking around several cookbooks this past week and noticed several variants of a stir fry salad meal. Well, I like to think of it as a lunchtime snack during the great amount of heat we are getting here in Texas.

So I grabbed the ingredients and went to work. It was quite simple when looking at it since I had everything at hand already.

Ingredients:
3 LG White Button Mushrooms (sliced)
5 Scallions/Green Onions (diced)
1 Handful of Snap Peas
5 Florettes of Broccoli
Frozen Peas and Corn
Sesame Seed Oil
Vegetable Oil
Teriyaki Sauce
Stir Fry Sauce
Soy Sauce
Sake
Salad Mix
Italian Salad Dressing
Parmesan Cheese

I grabbed my trusty Wok and poured some Vegetable Oil into it and let it cover the bottom and part of the side(by moving the Wok around, not putting in an entire bottle of Oil!), then turned the heat on to med-high.

Once I saw that the oil was heated properly, I added in the frozen vegetables. I also added in a little bit of Sesame Seed Oil at this point. Stir. Let them cook for a minute or three since they have more cooking going on since they were frozen.

After that, I added in the Sake, mushrooms, scallions, snap peas, and broccoli. Don't be afraid to be liberal with the Sake since most of it burns off anyways. You will most likely get an amazing blast of vegetable smells at this point. It's amazing. Don't forget to stir a lot here.

A few minutes after this, I added Teriyaki Sauce, Soy Sauce, and Stir Fry Sauce to the mix. Lots of stirring here to make sure the sauces get to everything in the Wok.

Cook until your frequent tastings of the stir fry taste about right. Turn off the heat.

NOW...you grab your Salad Mix and put some on a plate, making sure to wash them as well. Then once those are on the plate, a light dusting of Parmesan Cheese and the plate is ready for stir fry. So pile on however much stir fry you can handle in one sitting on top...or just enough so it is a good mix.

On the side you probably noticed the dipping sauce/salad dressing...well, that is a mix of Sake, Italian Salad Dressing, Teriyaki Sauce, and Soy Sauce. It is quite tasty and simply stirred together. Enjoy.

Stir Fry

After procuring a Wok the other day, I decided to cook some stir fry...it might have gone the other way around. Either way, I have a wok and want to cook some Stir Fry. Who doesn't like Stir Fry?

I would like to say that I was able to throw everything together out of nothing and make this amazing dish, however I used frozen stir fry mix of vegetables. Sad I know, however I do like it since I was unable to find bamboo shoots, baby corns, and the like very easily today.

So I have the stir fry mix, along with some snow peas and snap peas. I start by coating the Wok with some peanut oil. Once that starts simmering, I add in the frozen vegetables. You might need to toss in some water to steam the vegetables a bit so they can cook properly. It's what I did. Put some Sesame Seed Oil in now if you have it.

Put in the Snap Peas and Snow Peas. I do this a little bit later since they are not frozen and won't have to defrost and all.

So after a few minutes of cooking, make sure to stir around a bunch, I grabbed my sauces. Yes, plural. I used a healthy 2 spoonfuls of Stir Fry sauce and 2 spoonfuls of Sweet Sour sauce. I cleared a spot in the middle of the Wok and added those two in. I then stirred so the sauce would be even throughout. After that, I added in a dash of Teriyaki Sauce and Low Sodium Soy Sauce.

Once done, take out and enjoy. You could even cook up some rice and put the Stir Fry on top.