Stir Fry

A stir fry is one of my favourite things to make when there are people coming over for supper. It's extremely cheap and you almost always end up with leftovers. This version should feed 4 people on an average night, or 3 extremely hungry people. The ingredients for a stir fry are extremely malleable based on your own taste preferences, this is just my personal favourite set.

What You'll Need

For the sauce:

- 3/4 cup water

- 3/4 cup packed brown sugar

- 3 tbls. soya sauce

- 2 tbls. corn starch

- 1 tbls. honey

- 2-4 cloves of fresh garlic, chopped finely or run through a press

- 1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes

The rest:

- 2 large carrots, peeled and chopped how you like

- 2 good sized medallion steaks cut into small strips

- 1/2 head of cauliflower cut into bite sized pieces

- 1 head of broccoli also in bite sized florets

- 200g of sugar snap peas, with tips cut off (my preference)

- 1 can of bamboo chutes

- 1 cup of rice cooked in 1 and 1/2 cup of lightly salted water (you can use chicken broth or coconut milk instead of water if you prefer to flavour your rice)

Putting It Together

The sauce first!

Combine the dry ingredients together first, adding the brown sugar to the corn starch and stirring until mixed evenly. Add the water, soya sauce, honey, red pepper flakes and freshly chopped garlic and put it to boil stirring constantly. Let the sauce reduce until it is a little bit thicker than you want it to be after adding it to the rest of the dish, as it will thin out a bit from the moisture in the meat and vegetables. Once this is done, set it aside for later.

Time to get everything going!

The rice is the first thing that needs to go on to the burner, however at the same time it's best to get some water boiling in a larger pot in preparation to steam the vegetables. The lid must be left on the rice at all time while it's cooking. Once the water in the pot begins to boil, remove the pot from the burner and shut it off so the rice doesn't overcook, leave the lid on to let the boiling water steam the rice and cook it through over the next 10 minutes or so. As you take the pot of rice off the burner, put the vegetables in a strainer or steam tray on top of the pot of water that should now be at a rolling boil. As soon as the veggies are on, put a pan with a dash of olive oil on the oven at medium-high heat. 4 minutes into steaming the vegetables, add the strips of beef to the hot pan, stirring quickly to make sure all sides get browned. 3 minutes should be enough to cook all the meat, and the vegetables are now steamed after a combined 7 minutes, so take them off the burner. If there's a lot of fluid in the pan with the meat, drain it or your sauce will be very thin. After this is done, add in the vegetables to the pan with the meat, and pour the sauce over the combined ingredients stirring as you go. Make sure everything is covered in sauce to your liking before turning off the burner. When it's ready to go, it should look like the picture to the right.

Time to serve up!

Get some rice on the plate, poor your favourite drink and layer the food on the plate. Eat to your hearts content because it's actually a pretty healthy meal.