Modular Stir Fry
Stir fry is so good but it's hard to make in large batches. It's pretty labor intensive and doesn't last long sitting in the fridge as leftovers. This version is at least substantially less labor-intensive, and is just as good or better as leftovers day later. The trick is to keep it modular. Plaintext version.
Module 1: Stir-fried vegetables
Ingredients:
- Five large bags (~1kg each) of frozen stir-fry vegetables of your choice. (I told you, this is a large batch recipe...)
- ~8 small brown onions (optional but strongly recommended)
- 5 tbsp diced pickled garlic (or fresh if you're fancy) (optional but recommended)
- 10 tbsp olive oil
- ~10 hot red chilis, or, dried chili flakes.
Preparation:
Dice the onions. In a large frying pan or wok, heat 2-3 tablespoons of olive oil with about a quarter of the onions and garlic. If you have fresh hot chilis, finely dice them and add one quarter of it to the onions. If you use dried chilis instead, these can be sprinkled on when serving to each person's heat preferences.
When the onions are browning, add one quarter of the frozen vegetables. You'll probably have to boil off some excess water from the vegetables; the trick is to do this without the vegetables getting too soggy. I usually push the vegetables up the side of the wok so any excess water can drain down to the center and quickly boil off; after a little while of this the vegetables can go on the hot part of the pan for a quick searing before taking them off.
Repeat three times with the remaining ingredients. During the downtime of this process, you can also work on...
Module 2: Crispy fried tofu
Turn three large blocks of firm tofu into crispy fried tofu. Next up...
Module 3: Sweet and sour sauce
Ingredients:
- Two cups pineapple juice
- 1 cup water
- 6 tbsp rice vinegar
- 2 tbsp soy sauce
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 6 tbsp corn starch
Preparation:
Combine all ingredients in a sauce pan. Stir continually while heating. Wait until the whole mix suddenly turns somewhat gelatinous and transparent. Remove from heat.Module 4: Rice
Boil the rice. Add some salt to the water if you want to get really crazy.
Serving
Combine all four modules in a bowl. If you omitted fresh hot chilis, sprinkle on dried chili flakes to taste.
If you store the modules separately, you can eat this as leftovers for days and days and it doesn't get any worse. Also if you run short on just one ingredient, you can top up the supply of just that component, and hopefully starting an endless cycle of stir fry that you can never escape from...
