Chicken, Broccoli & Mushroom Stir Fry

Slightly sweet and slightly spicy, this make-at-home Chinese take-out style meal is much healthier and so much more satisfying than anything you’ll bring home from a take-out place.

Stir fry is an infinitely variable meal. Add any protein and almost any vegetables, stir them around a hot pan, throw in some variety of sauce or seasoning, and you’ve got a meal.

My brother never makes the same stir fry twice – he always invents something original on the spot. Not all of us can do that, so I stick to the tried and true. This is my go-to stir-fry, at least as far as the sauce goes.

I do vary the vegetables that go in depending on the season or what I happen to have in the fridge or freezer. But you have to start somewhere, and these veggies are by far my favorites in a stir-fry.

I like stir-fried veggies crisp-tender, which is easier to do with dense veggies like broccoli and cabbage.

It’s All About The Sauce

To make a good stir fry, you need a good sauce. While you can buy delicious stir-fry sauces ready-made, it’s super easy to make your own. It’s also more budget-friendly and healthier.

The base of my standard stir-fry sauce is soy sauce. Use a good-quality, low-sodium soy sauce for the best flavor.

You also want a hint of sweetness. I like to use honey, but you can also use brown sugar or natural unrefined sugar.

Rice vinegar and sesame oil add depth of flavor and make the sauce taste more authentically Chinese.

Ginger and garlic are the punchier flavors. I always use fresh ginger root. It gives way better flavor than powdered ginger. I keep my ginger in the freezer to make it easier to grate. Mince the garlic or use a garlic press.

Cornstarch is an important addition to the sauce. It acts as the thickener so that the sauce turns out saucy and not just a runny soup on your plate. You can use flour, but cornstarch thickens much faster and more reliably.

Pick a Veggie, Any Veggie

The thing about stir-fry is that you can use almost any combination of vegetables. It’s easy to adapt your meal to include whatever’s in season or readily available.

Cabbage, whether green, red, or napa, makes a good bulk veggie to increase the overall volume of your meal.

Broccoli, cauliflower, and carrots take a little bit longer cooking time than some other veggies, and provide that perfect crisp-tender texture characteristic of a good stir-fry.

Other fantastic veggies to throw into a stir-fry are snow peas, bok choy, mushrooms, green or red peppers, baby corn, or kale.

Any and all of these veggies work really well with the flavor of my standard sauce. One that I avoid, however, is Swiss chard. The slightly bitter taste seems to overtake everything else. But of course, that’s just my personal preference.

Pick a Protein, Any Protein

I tend to use chicken as the protein in my stir-fry most of the time. It’s budget-friendly and versatile. Pork and beef also work well.

If you want a vegetarian option, you can use tofu, seitan, beans, or even peanuts to increase the protein level.

If you’re using meat, soften the onions just prior to adding the meat. Fully cook the meat before removing it from the heat.

Let me explain the reasoning for this. You want the meat fully cooked, but not overcooked.

If you add the vegetables before the meat is finished cooking, you may end up with undercooked meat. If you fully cook the meat and then add the vegetables to the skillet, you’ll end up with tough, overcooked meat.

For perfectly cooked meat, cook it separately from the vegetables – either in the same skillet first, or in a separate skillet. Then, add it back into the skillet with the cooked veggies.

Cooking Times

Whether you’re starting with onions and chicken or going straight in for the veggies, you need to preheat your skillet or wok with a bit of cooking oil.

The healthiest option when choosing an oil for pan-frying food is an oil with a high smoke point. Olive oil is good when it’s not going to be heated too hot. Better oil alternatives with higher smoke points are coconut oil and avocado oil.

When making a stir-fry, it works best to have all the ingredients chopped and ready to go. Different veggies require different cooking times.

More dense vegetables like cabbage, broccoli, and carrots need closer to 10 minutes of total cooking time. Softer veggies like peppers, peas, and mushrooms only need about 3 minutes of total cooking time.

First, add the denser veggies to the skillet for extra cooking time. Once they’ve gotten a head start, add the remaining veggies according to the cooking time they will need.

Bringing It All Together

After the veggies are finished cooking, add back in the meat cooked previously, allow to rewarm for a moment, then add in the prepared sauce.

If you’ve used cornstarch as the thickener, it will only take a minute or two to thicken once it hits the heat. In an instant, you’ve gone from a skillet of rather boring sauteed vegetables to a mouth-watering stir-fry.

Remove from heat and serve immediately over white or brown rice or quinoa. Add sesame seeds or green onions as a garnish if desired.