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Stir Crazy! : More than 100 Quick, Low-Fat Recipes for Your Wok or Stir-Fry Pan

From Moroccan lentil tangine to mushroom-stuffed streamed buns, Stir Crazy! shows readers how to create more than 100 memorable, meatless meals in minutes! And not only can each recipe easily be made in a wok or stir-fry pan, but all are high in flavor and naturally low in fat--combining the irresistible flavors of fresh vegetables, fruits, herbs, and spices with staples such as grains, noodles, beans, nuts, seeds, oils, and seasonings. Stir Crazy! even includes helpful advice on selecting pans and accessories, streamlining cooking methods, and more.

I just made the most delicious healthy thing. I call it, "Shitaco"

Take Wild/Brown Rice with Shitaki Mushrooms, add chopped walnuts, and put it in a shell of nori (sheet of roasted seaweed -like sushi). YUM!

Recipe to follow. This is gaijin cuisine. Gaijin is Japanese for "space alien" or "person from another country". The Shitaco is vegan, probiotic, with healthy fats and completely "YUM". Photos taken with my Motorola RAZR.

15 - 16 oz Wild & Brown Rice Blend (organic)
2 large handfuls of dried shitake mushrooms (chinatown)
1 32oz Soy Ginger Broth (comes in rice-milkish carton @ Trader Joe's {organic})
Extra cup of H20
2 tbs chopped garlic (hooray for the little jars)
half a purple onion (green onions would be cool too)
olive oil (for caramelizing onions and garlic)
course fresh ground black, white, and coulored peppercorns
walnuts (optional, but I like to live dangerously {organic, from farmer's market in Berkeley})
sheet of nori (sushi-style sheet of roasted seaweed)
wax paper

In rice pan: rice, shrooms, broth, and water, boil, stir, turn on low, cover with lid, 45 mins, or until water is absorbed. Stir.

Meanwhile, brown garlic and onions in little fry pan with olive oil. Aside from the fat in the walnuts, this is the only fat in this dish, and it's all healthy fats. Add caramelized garlic and onions to rice after all the water had been absorbed. You can put some pepper in now too, but save some peppering for the end with the walnuts too. Pepper = fresher ground the better.

Cool the rice. You don't have to, but it's more japanesey this way. Hot rice makes your nori soggy faster, too. I make this rice the night before, have some with a "Tasty Bite", then the Shitaco makes another meal the next day. And I love it that you don't reheat the rice. Eat and run food, totally.

I cut my nori sheet in half to about a 5 cm by 10cm piece. Then ball about a 1/4 cup of wild rice in the wax paper. Press it into a little flat square-ish patty. Press chopped walnuts in there (1 1/2 walnut per roll), and now's the time for more pepper. Flip rice patty into nori square, fold nori like book, serve (eat) immediately. When longer you wait, the nori is less crisp. You want your nori crisp, don't you? I knew you did.

Your ogenki is golden like the light of heaven...

This is a quintessential Filipino dish made by slow-cooking pork in a mixture of vinegar, soy sauce, garlic, bay leaf and black peppercorns, then pan-frying it for extra crispiness. It's one of our favourite foods!

Recipe

Ted's adobo

INGREDIENTS

1 1/2 cups water
1 cup vinegar (palm vinegar or, in this case, apple cider vinegar)
4 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon whole black peppercorns
1 head garlic, crushed
1 kg pork belly
2 bay leaves

DIRECTIONS

1. In a large pot, combine the water, vinegar, soy sauce, peppercorns, garlic and bay leaves then stir. Soak the meat in this vinegar mixture for 1 hour.

2. Place the pot over low heat and simmer, uncovered, for 20 minutes.

3. Brown the meat by transferring it to a skillet over high heat and frying for a few minutes, turning so that all sides are browned. (Keep the vinegar mixture in the pot.)

4. After browning, return the meat to the pot with the vinegar mixture and simmer over low heat until only a small amount of sauce is left.

5. Serve with garlic rice and sliced tomatoes.

Note: chicken, or a combination of chicken and pork, can also be used.