Watch me make a flexible, fast stir-fry with Gochujang!
As a cooking teacher and recipe maker, I love hearing from people who take the recipes home and make them. I also hear a common refrain: “Cooking healthy just takes too much time.”
I feel you, I really do. I work, and often after cooking all day for someone else, or testing recipes for publication, I’m tired and hungry, just like you. So, I try to come up with some easy, fast recipes that you actually can make on a weeknight. The fast stir fry is always a good solution.
This recipe is an example of just how quickly you can make a real, vegetable rich meal in about 20 minutes. Yes, you chop some veggies, and assemble a few ingredients for the sauce, but it shouldn’t take long to do that.
(I also wrote a Vegan Meal Prep cookbook to help you set yourself up with once a week prep sessions!)
Quick Plant Based Meals are the way to go
In this recipe, you save time by using mock duck, which is already seasoned and cooked. It’s made from gluten, so if you want to avoid wheat and gluten, you can easily sub with tofu or another protein. I stocked up on mock duck when the pandemic panic shopping started, so I would have some plant-based protein for a fast stir fry in the pantry. I always keep Gochujang in the fridge, along with my Sriracha and a few other hot sauces. I can’t help it, I like having options! Gochujang is growing in popularity, thanks to interest in Korean cooking and the fact that it is fermented. I’ve obsessed about it before, in these posts about Inspired Korean Style Lettuce Wraps , and a Tasty Korean Influenced Bowl.
In my video, I served the stir-fry over brown rice, but if you are going for a faster whole grain, cook some quinoa. Whole wheat pasta would work, too, linguine and spaghetti are good stand-ins for white flour noodles, and eating whole grain is always better. You can make a fast stir fry any night of the week, I promise!
Korean Style Stir Fry
Ingredients
Sauce
- 3 tablespoons gochujang paste
- 2 tablespoons rice wine or sherry
- 2 tablespoons tamari or soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon dark sesame oil
- 1 tablespoon organic sugar
- 1 tablespoon chopped garlic
- 1 tablespoon chopped ginger
- 1/4 teaspoon turmeric
Stir Fry
- 4 cups stir-fry vegetables
- 2 cans mock duck drained and torn
- slivered scallions, chopped peanuts for garnish
- cooked rice or other grain
Instructions
- In a cup or small bowl, combine the gochujang, rice wine, tamari, sesame oil, sugar and turmeric. Stir vigorously to combine. Prep the garlic, ginger, mock duck, and vegetables and keep everything in its own little pile.
- Place a wok or other heavy, large saute pan over high heat. Let the pan get hot for several seconds, then drizzle in the avocado oil. Swirl to coat the bottom of the pan. Add the mock duck and scrape and stir. Stir until lightly browned. Add the hardest vegetables first, carrots and cauliflower before softer snow peas or zucchini.
- When the vegetables are just crisp-tender, stir the sauce again and drizzle over the stir-fry. Stir quickly to coat and cook, it will quickly reduce to coat the stir-fry.Serve over cooked grains, sprinkled with scallions and peanuts, if desired.
