Kitchen Adventures: Look Ma, No Recipe!

I'm working to get more vegetables into my diet, and during an open call for recipes on my social media networks, my good friend Tanya reminded me about stir frying.

Shortly after I graduated from college, I actually bought a real wok. One that you had to season properly and cook with on correct heat settings, etc. So I was pretty much a failure in my early stir fry attempts, and the wok found the trash can once I managed to ruin it.

The other issue I had learning to stir fry was my lack of a basic understanding of the sizes you needed to chop food into so it got cooked through but not too done. And the order to cook hings in, like cooking heavier veggies like broccoli first because they take more time to get done than snow peas. I realize now it's not hard, but when you're in your 20's, busy trying to be professional party girl and meet as many boys as possible, the logic portion of your brain doesn't engage long when it comes to boring subjects like cooking.

But when I went to the market yesterday, it was beautiful sunny weather and the produce at the store was looking good, so I threw caution to the wind, picked some stuff that looked pretty and headed home determined to make a success out of stir frying -- even without a recipe as a guide. 

As much as I love veggies, I hate the time it takes to prep them (probably why I haven't made much stir fry lately...okay EVER). But with the help of a nice glass of wine and a phone call to distract me while I was chopping, I hacked up enough veg for what should be one week of dinners.

Last night my veggie selection was carrots, red and green peppers, yellow squash and broccoli prepared in teriyaki sauce with some noodles added since I didn't have any protein included.

Rice noodles were a new experiment for me as well. You have to boil them for about 8 minutes before using them in your dish, which turned out to be the perfect amount of time to get the veggies to cook.

I have to admit, it was pretty damn good and I was proud of myself. I probably made enough for two people, so I need to work on my portions a bit. All in all, I give it a big thumbs up!

Now I'll probably be stir frying until I'm sick an tired of veggies. But I think that's a good problem to have.