NewsBite

Advertisement
Good Food logo

Adam Liaw’s adaptable ‘two-ingredient’ stir-fry with pork and capsicum (or chicken, mushrooms ... )

Adam Liaw
Adam Liaw

Advertisement
Don’t overwhelm your stir-fry with a medley of vegies from the fridge. Keep it simple with one protein and one vegetable.
Don’t overwhelm your stir-fry with a medley of vegies from the fridge. Keep it simple with one protein and one vegetable.William Meppem

Our next recipe in this series is a quick “two ingredient” stir-fry. One of China’s most popular dishes, qing jiao rousi (pork strips with green peppers) has variations around the country. I’ve given you a recipe, but think of it more as a framework (see tips below). Switch the pork for beef and the capsicum for snow peas and you have a completely different dish. Or try chicken and mushrooms. Or prawns and green beans. There are endless possibilities.

A simple stir-fry is a marvel of the midweek dinner. I am constantly amazed by how something so quick and simple can be so versatile and delicious.

Advertisement

Ingredients

  • 180g pork tenderloin or shoulder

  • 2 medium green capsicums

  • 3 tbsp vegetable oil

  • 3 thin slices ginger, unpeeled

  • 2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped

  • 1 tbsp oyster sauce

  • 1 tbsp Shaoxing wine

  • 1 tsp soy sauce

  • a good pinch of sugar

  • 1 tsp cornflour or potato starch, mixed with ¼ cup of water

Marinade

  • 1 tsp soy sauce

  • ½ tsp sugar

  • 1 tsp cornflour or potato starch

  • ¼ tsp of bicarbonate of soda

  • ½ tbsp Shaoxing wine

  • 2 tsp vegetable oil

Method

  1. Step 1

    First, cut the pork across the grain into thin slices about 3mm thick, then cut the slices into 3mm strips. Combine the pork with the meat marinade ingredients and set aside for 10 minutes. Slice the capsicums into thin strips, removing the seeds and white pith.

  2. Step 2

    Heat a wok over high heat until smoking and very hot, then add the oil and swirl it around the wok to coat. Add the capsicum to the wok and toss for about a minute until just starting to soften, then remove from the wok with a slotted spoon, leaving the oil in the wok and adding a little more oil if needed.

  3. Step 3

    Allow the wok to return to temperature, then add the pork, spreading it over the base of the wok in a single layer. Allow the pork to brown without stirring or tossing, then toss for about 1 minute until just cooked. Add the ginger and garlic and toss for a few seconds until fragrant.

  4. Step 4

    Return the capsicum to the wok and add the oyster sauce, Shaoxing wine, soy sauce and sugar and toss to combine everything together. Drizzle in a little of the cornflour mixture while shaking the wok to thicken any juices that have formed in the base of the wok. Transfer to a serving plate and serve.

Tips

Composition

We often think of stir-fried dishes as restaurant-style “meat plus sauce” (plus a whole pile of vegetables) – think lemon chicken, sweet and sour pork, or Mongolian beef. For home cooking I want you to think a little differently.

A home-cooked stir-fry should really taste of its ingredients. This recipe is pork and capsicum, and should taste of those two things. Don’t try to clean out the fridge so that you can add in an entire vegetable medley. More ingredients will just confuse the flavour.

When it comes to sauces (in this case, oyster sauce, a bit of Shaoxing wine and soy sauce) they’re added sparingly as seasonings to the main ingredients. The sauces shouldn’t overwhelm the taste of the ingredients. You want a dish that tastes first and foremost of pork and capsicum, not of oyster sauce, and in any case the main component of any final “sauce” will be the liquids released by the meat or vegetables that we then thicken by adding a little starch (more on that below).

Marinating the meat

A basic stir-fry marinade is more of a coating than a marinade. It contains ingredients to season the meat such as salt, soy sauce, Shaoxing wine and sometimes sugar. There’s also starch to help the meat brown, give it a silky texture in the sauce, and to help the sauce coat the meat.

One ingredient I also often add to the marinade is a little bicarb. Bicarbonate of soda is alkaline, which inhibits protein bonding, which will keep the meat more tender. In Chinese restaurants, meat is often soaked in water that has had baking soda added to it and then rinsed to give that signature texture, but I find adding just a little to the marinade is much easier.

This marinade doesn’t have to sit on the meat for very long. Ten minutes is fine, but there’s nothing wrong with marinating for longer (or shorter).

Keeping your wok very, very hot is crucial to a good stir-fry.
Keeping your wok very, very hot is crucial to a good stir-fry.Anna Kucera

Stir-frying technique

Technique is all-important, and for home cooking, there are a few simple things to bear in mind.

  1. Firstly, don’t overload the wok. I will most often fry each ingredient separately, removing each from the wok after it’s fried, and then combine them together very quickly at the end. This avoids overloading the wok and turning your stir-fry into a stew.
  2. Secondly, when frying the meat you want to get your wok very, very hot, then spread the meat in a single layer so that it browns. It doesn’t need to brown all over, but that initial sear is very important for that “wok hei” (breath of the wok) flavour. Use a little more oil than you think you need for this step. Not using enough oil is a common mistake for wok frying.
  3. Lastly, the final step is creating the sauce in the wok. This process is more like creating a pan jus or gravy than it is dolloping on a sauce. Once you’ve recombined everything in the wok, the oils, seasonings and liquid released by the ingredients will often create a bit of liquid. Thickening that liquid with a slurry of cornflour will create the “sauce” for your simple stir-fry. Drizzle in a little cornflour mixed with cold water while tossing the wok. Just eyeball it and stop when the sauce is silky and coating the ingredients. Don’t skip this step. It’s absolutely vital for completing a good wok-fried dish.

The best recipes from Australia's leading chefs straight to your inbox.

Sign up
Adam LiawAdam Liaw is a cookbook author and food writer, co-host of Good Food Kitchen and former MasterChef winner.

From our partners

Advertisement
Advertisement

Similar Recipes

More by Adam Liaw

Original URL: https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/goodfood/recipes/adam-liaw-s-adaptable-two-ingredient-stir-fry-with-pork-and-capsicum-or-chicken-mushrooms-20230418-p5d1b3.html