From Sesame Chicken to Stir-Fry Pork

I know, you’re reading the title and thinking ??????? What is she up to now? Has she completely lost her mind?  Well maybe, but not for the reasons that you may think.  I may be crazy in all other aspects of my life, but in the kitchen I know exactly what I am doing (or at least I put on a good show so everyone is fooled into thinking that ).  🙂   By now, you all should know I hate throwing food away if I don’t have to, and that means waving my magic spoon and stirring with my magic whisk to re-create something completely different from leftovers that I already have.  I have nothing against eating leftovers just as they are, but as a creative person, I get bored easily, and I just have this burning desire from deep within that drives me to create, or in a lot of cases, re-create.  Hence my reigning title as “The Queen of Leftovers”; a title I have no intentions of surrendering anytime soon.  This time, I had a lot of sauce leftover from when I made my sesame chicken and I did not want to just throw it away if I didn’t have to, nor did I want to have the same exact dish all over again so soon.  Sesame Chicken  We had pork chops and a wide variety of vegetables, so an Asian pork stir-fry with vegetables it was.  All I needed to do was to add a few different ingredients, and voila, it was a new sauce and a new dish.  Don’t worry, it was extra sauce that was nowhere near the chicken.  I would never cross contaminate my foods like that.

 

I love all vegetables and I always have a wide variety on hand at any given time.  We eat a lot of vegetables, and I am always mixing them up. We always have vegetables with more vegetables.   I love mixing up a whole bunch of colors and textures of my vegetables too.  So mix them up yourselves, and use what you like, in any combination you like.  There is no right or wrong types of vegetables to use.  This time I used, red bell peppers, fresh green beans, mushrooms, jalapenos, shallots, kobiashi squash or pumpkin and green onions (Yes, soon all those little mini pumpkins in the background will be cooked up and used as well).  If you are using both soft and hearty vegetables, saute your heartier ones first and add your softer ones towards the end of the cooking process.  I cooked them in a combination of both olive oil and sesame oil with chilies in a hot skillet.  If you have a wok, that’s fine too.  I have one, I just very rarely use it.  For whatever reason, I prefer using my large skillet.

I sliced the pork into thin strips that were about 1 1/2″x 1/2′ in size.  Once the vegetables were cooked, I added the pork to the vegetables and continued cooking until the pork was completely cooked.  While everything is cooking.  I made the additions to my sauce.

As I said above, I used my leftover sauce from my sesame chicken Sesame Chicken then I added about 1 heaping TBSP of each garlic, fresh ginger and hot Chinese spicy mustard.  To make the sauce a little thicker, if you want, you can add a little cornstarch mixed with water to the sauce.  I was going to use it, but the sauce did not need it this time.  It was fine just the way it was, so no cornstarch was needed.

Once everything is completely cooked, add the sauce to the pork and vegetable mixture, and combine well.  Add sliced green onions right before serving.

I served my stir-fry over white rice along with some crispy pan-fried dumplings and a crisp and fruity chardonnay, but a semi-sweet Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc or Gewertztrameiner would be nice wines to go with the meal as well.

**** You can easily substitute chicken or shrimp, or a combination of chicken, shrimp and/or pork if you like.  You can also make it vegetarian and/or vegan simply by removing the meat and adding tofu and/or other vegan products.