You can find the recipe in the "Recipes & Cooking" section of the BHG website, more specifically at http://www.bhg.com/recipe/beef/beef-and-bean-stir-fry/.
Ingredients:
- "2 tablespoons vegetable oil [I think this is a place you could use any oil you like--light olive oil, grapeseed oil, sesame oil, etc.]
- 1 pound boneless beef top loin steak, trimmed of fat and cut in thin strips
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 teaspoon chopped fresh ginger [as finely as you can]
- 2 carrots, thinly diagonally sliced [I used baby carrots--maybe 20-25 of them--cut in half lengthwise]
- 3 1/2 cups broccoli florets (8 ounces) [one head of broccoli will do]
- 6 green onions, cut in long thin strips [I got to use our farm-share green onions here, so that made me pretty happy. Also, I think you can chop the onions into little rounds--as you normally might--instead of long strips, as chopping is a little easier.]
- 1/4 cup orange juice concentrate, thawed, or orange juice
- 2 tablespoons reduced-sodium soy sauce
- 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper [I left this out; just garnish the dish with sriracha sauce for the same taste. That way, you can keep those who like mild food happy.]
- 1 15-ounce can of cannellini beans
1.
In a large pan,
heat 1 tablespoon of the oil over medium-high heat. Cook and stir beef,
garlic, and ginger until beef is browned, about 2 to 3 minutes. Remove
from skillet. Heat remaining oil. Add carrots and broccoli; cook and
stir 3 minutes. Add green onions; cook 1 minute more.
2.
Add orange juice concentrate, soy sauce, and crushed
red pepper [if using]; toss to coat [you can let it sit for a minute or so]. Add [beans and then the cooked beef]; cook until heated
through [about 3-4 more minutes]. Makes 4 servings."
Note: To encourage the vegetables to cook through, you can partially cover the pan with a lid, if you wish (just leave some room for the steam to escape).
This is another really versatile recipe. If you don't like beef, you can use chicken. If you are vegetarian, you can use tofu or substitute the meat for an additional vegetable. And the kinds of vegetables you can use in the dish are quite numerous: pea pods, peppers, onions, baby corns, water chestnuts, bok choi, mushrooms, etc. Whatever you like in an Asian dish can be added to this stir fry. In addition, you can serve the dish with whatever you like. I used some Wel-Pac Chow Mein Stir-Fry noodles (which cook in just 3 minutes), but you could serve another kind of noodle or even just rice. It's all up to you! Mom was really great again this week, as she made a very nice melon-and-strawberry fruit salad to go alongside the stir fry. Because stir fries already have so many delicious vegetables in them, it is sometimes hard for me to justify serving a vegetable side dish, but dinner just doesn't feel complete if we eat everything out of the same dish. A fruit salad really solves that little problem for me because it's not vegetables, but it's another nutritious item that helps round out the meal nicely. I guess I'm just neurotic like that. But in all seriousness, the fruit was perfect because it helped cool the spiciness of the sriracha sauce that Cami and I used to garnish our stir fry (Mom doesn't like spicy, so we had to leave the crushed red pepper out of the recipe).
Overall, we all really enjoyed the dish. Like I said, it has great classic Asian flavors in their most basic form, so it's hard to go wrong with this meal. I actually thought the beans were a little much. They made the dish a bit too filling, maybe more appropriate for winter than for summer. I think next time, I would replace the cannellini beans with something lighter like pea pods. However, one thing I did really love about the dish was the fresh ginger, which is one of my favorite ingredients. It helps with digestion, and it just reminds me so much of eating sushi (a favorite dish of mine). Anyway, this is a great weekday meal that will satisfy both light and heavy appetites because you can make it as light or as heavy as you want.
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| You gotta love the bright colors on this one. Photo enhanced with the Brannan filter on Instagram. |
I found the recipe while I was perusing Facebook one day, and I thought it would be perfect for a night like the Fourth. I know, I know. It seems a little unpatriotic to serve an Italian dish on Independence Day, but the weather was hot enough to warrant a nice cool salad and a little relaxation of the "rules" for Fourth-of-July cooking (hey, at least we had steak, right?).
The original recipe can be found at http://www.simplicityinthesouth.com/2013/04/italian-summer-salad.html and is authored by blogger Tricia @ Simplicity in the South.
The note with the recipe reads, "Originally named Robert Wagner's Marinated Veggies, this vegetarian dish is sure to please a crowd. It's best to give this salad time to marinate overnight. [But] it's pretty delicious as it is."
Ingredients (serves 6-8):
One red, yellow, and green bell pepper (three peppers in total), sliced into strips
Two celery stalks, chopped
Four ounces of white button mushrooms, sliced (that's about half a package from a regular grocery store like Cub)
One can of palm hearts, chopped into pieces about as big as the celery slices
One jar of marinated artichoke hearts, chopped into rough pieces (add the liquid, too)
Eight ounces of fresh mozzarella cheese, chopped into cubes (about 1 cm by 1 cm; eight ounces is one packaged mozzarella ball at the grocery store)
1/2 cup green olives stuffed with pimentos (about half of a jar, if you want to estimate instead of directly measuring)
2 large garlic cloves, minced (I used four smaller ones)
1/2 cup of extra-virgin olive oil (it seems like a lot, but it's not)
2 tbsp red wine vinegar
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp dried oregano
Salt and ground black pepper, to taste
This is so simple that it doesn't even need a numbered list of directions. Just chop/slice everything and mix it together in a bowl with the oil, vinegar, and seasonings. Then, it can sit in the refrigerator either overnight (if you want it for lunch) or during the day (if you make it in the morning to eat with dinner).
I must say right away that this is a fabulous salad. It really hit the spot with the meat. The flavors were perfectly balanced, and there was just enough salt and pepper not to require any extra on top at serving time. I loved the contrast between the crunch of the peppers and celery and the soft, tender texture of the fresh mozzarella, palm hearts, and artichoke hearts. Furthermore, the slight bitterness of the green pepper plus the acidity of the vinegar contrasted nicely with the smooth richness of the oil, the creamy cheese, and the sweetness of the celery and the other peppers.
One thing that I love about this recipe--besides how fool-proof and pretty it is--is that it has so many routes for alteration, if you desire. For instance, Mom suggested that you could plate the salad on a bed of fresh lettuce or add some cauliflower, broccoli, or tomatoes right at the end (to prevent sogginess). I thought summer squash like zucchini and patty pans might be nice, too. I suppose you could try fresh basil and oregano instead of dried, but I think that the dried versions have more concentrated flavor, which is what you want, so I don't think I would use the fresh versions next time, but if any of you out there do, please let me know how it goes. Other improvements might be adding some prosciutto if you feel like you need some meat, and you could even cook up some pasta and add that, too. Thus, you would have a heavier dish to serve as a main course for lunch or to bring to a picnic or potluck.
I think it was fine to not marinate the salad overnight, even though that's what the original recipe called for. However, I will be interested to eat the salad on the second day to see if the flavors have matured even further from where they were at dinner.
I thought it was really fun to use palm hearts because they are not a common ingredient. If you have never tried them, they have a soft texture like artichoke hearts, but they are smoother and creamier than artichoke hearts. They have a mild, slightly salty flavor and mainly serve to "carry" other flavors and to provide some tenderness rather than to bring any new tastes to the table, so to speak.
Interestingly enough, palm hearts are quite common in Costa Rican cooking. The only reason that I know this is because I visited the country about four years ago with my Spanish class, and while there, I sampled palm hearts both straight out of a can (at the home of my host family) as well as on top of a green lettuce salad with tomatoes (at a restaurant). I guess they are eaten more in places that have more palm trees, which makes a lot of sense. Think about how much seafood is eaten in the ocean-bordered New England states. But I digress (again) quite far from the point of this post.
Getting back the recipe, one thing I will note is that there is quite a bit of prep work with all the vegetables that need to be sliced or chopped, meaning that if you are in the kitchen alone, it could take you upwards of 30 minutes to finish assembling the salad. But, as with everything else, the time you put in up front is well worth the finished product. Perhaps some good music could help with the tedium of preparing the vegetables.
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| This salad is so beautiful that it doesn't even need to be enhanced with an Instagram filter. Huzzah for natural lighting and good looks! |
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