I hope everyone liked my first veggie recipe. For those of you who did, I have another one that I call Tofu and Vegetable Stir Fry; I promise the flavors are a lot more complex than the title. It’s a great combination of sweet, savory and spicy and most importantly, it’s incredibly nutritious. Remember, don’t be afraid to make whatever adjustments you’d like and use whatever veggies look the freshest. A note on technique, I boiled the broccoli and green beans in this recipe before I mixed them into the stir fry because I like them to be tender and not so tough, but if you like your vegetables to have a little more bite to them, just add them in with the onions and mushrooms. And if you did like the quinoa, it would also go great in this; I just used brown rice because it was all that was available.
Makes one generous size portion:
One of the cooking pans that is a little more rounded around the edges (like a saucepan rather than just a frying or sauté pan)
Enough water to cover about 2-3 inches of your saucepan
5-7 broccoli florets
6-8 green beans
Enough cooking oil to coat bottom of pan (preferably olive oil)
1 rounded spoonful of red onions (if they are not at the stir fry station, the salad station almost always has red onions; if there aren’t any, white onions are a perfectly good substitute)
1 rounded spoonful of peppers
1 rounded spoonful of mushrooms
1 rounded spoonful of shredded carrots (if carrots are cut into thicker pieces like a carrot stick for dipping, I would recommend boiling them with broccoli and green beans)
Half a spoonful of chopped garlic
Small pinches of the following spices: red pepper flakes, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, anise (if they don’t have the anise, it’s okay to leave it out)
10-12 pieces of tofu
Splash of teriyaki sauce
2 scoops of brown rice
Start by filling your saucepan with the water and place on the highest heat of the hotplate. Cover the pan with another frying pan and let the water boil (luckily these hotplates get very hot very quickly so the water boils within about 3-4 minutes). While the water is boiling, get the rest of your ingredients ready.
When the water is boiling, add the broccoli florets and green beans to the water, recover the pan with another to return the water to a boil, and cook for 2-3 minutes (you just want the vegetables to start getting tender). When the vegetables are done cooking, take them out of the water and then drain the water from the pan (I either pour it into 1 or 2 DC cups or into the sink where they wash all of the dishes).
Return the dry pan to the hotplate and heat the oil, then add red onions, peppers, mushrooms, and carrots. Turn the heat down to medium, medium-low (I think that’s 20-40 percent on the hot plates) and cook for approximately 5 minutes or until the vegetables soften and give up their water. Then add the garlic and sauté for approximately 2 minutes.
Then, add back the broccoli and the green beans, as well as the red pepper flakes, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, anise, tofu, and teriyaki sauce to the pan. Let those ingredients cook for a minute or two and then add the brown rice. Let the brown rice get up to temperature, 2-3 minutes, and that’s it.
I hope you like this recipe as much as the first one, and once again, if you have any questions, comments, suggestions, or feedback, please let me know so I can make changes. Thanks so much and I hope you enjoy!
