I grew up with amazing stirfries that my mom used to make for us all the time. My favourites were beef and brocolli, beef and zucchini and beef and green beans.
Although I also stirfry quite often for my family, I can never get them tasting quite as good as my mom's. That is, until this one. Usually my veggies are overcooked, my meat is a little on the chewier side, or the flavours just aren't the same. But it seems that I finally got one right. I managed to achieve a similar balance of flavours to the stirfries I remember and kept the meat tender and the veggies al dente.
The tricks?
- Starting with good meat, thinly sliced across the grain.
- Cooking everything separately. First browning the meat and removing it from the pan when it is just browned but not necessarily completely cooked. The slices are so thin that between residual cooking once removed from the pan and the additional cooking time once added back to the pan, they cook quickly and completely faster than we think. Then cooking the veggies until just fork tender. Doing these steps allows you to control the cooking time of the two main components, which cook at vastly different rates.
Hopefully this is a sign of great stirfries to come?
