Stir Fry
A stir fry is one of the easiest ways to add more veg to your diet. It is super quick, super simple, and super tasty! We have gathered some expert tips to help you take your family stir fry from good to great!
Why is stir fry so great?
A stir fry is a great last-minute convenience dish – grab a bag of stir fry veg, some noodles and sauce!
But it’s also great for keeping costs down, for adding plenty of veg in a tasty, simple way, and for cutting down on food waste by using up the veg in your fridge or the marked-down on-the-turn veg at the shops.
Once you learn the basic formula of a great stir fry, you can use this infinitely adaptable dish to make very easy, yummy meals feeding your family on a budget.
Use the basic recipe and tips below to take your stir fries from good to great!
How are your stir fry skills?
Getting
started
I’m just starting out.
Next
Level
I’m ready to take it to the next level.
Engaging
Kids
How can I get my kids involved and interested?
Getting Started
A stir fry is a great last-minute convenience dish when you just grab a bag of stir fry veg, some noodles and sauce!
But it’s also great for keeping costs down, for adding plenty of veg to a dish in a tasty, simple way, and for cutting down on food waste by using up the veg in your fridge or the marked-down on-the-turn veg at the shops.
Here is a simple recipe for a stir fry which you can use as a base and build on over time…
Stir Fry
Claire Wright
Ingredients:
Meat/veggie alternative, if using
Noodles/rice
Jar or packet of sauce
Sliced peppers or bag of stir-fry veg, optional
Method:
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Cook the meat/veggie alternative according to package instructions if using (usually this is just frying in a little oil until lightly golden, cooked through and piping hot). Set aside while you fry any veg you are using quickly over a high heat in a little oil.
-
Cook the noodles/rice according to packet instructions. Stir through the meat and/or veg and the sauce.
There is no need to go any further with this recipe until you are confident with it and feel up for the next step.
Feeling ready? Let’s see how you can get your next small victory without battles…
Engaging Kids
Kids who engage regularly with veg through veg-themed activities, such as arts and crafts, sensory experiences, growing and cooking are shown to be more likely to eat the veg they engage with. Encouraging kids to engage and play with veg is the handy first step to them developing a good relationship with veg and life-long healthy eating.
Kids in the kitchen
The eventual aim, if possible, is to get kids in the kitchen. Don’t worry, this doesn’t have to mean they are with you from start-to-end creating mess and rising stress levels! It can be as simple as giving them one small job (stirring, measuring, pouring, grating, chopping…) ideally involving veg. They can come in to do their little bit, and have fun with you for a few minutes. Getting them involved, making it playful and praising them plenty for their involvement, perhaps even serving it as dinner they “made”, makes it much more likely they will eat the food offered, not to mention teaching them important life skills. Find ideas, safety tips, videos and even a free chart in our Kids in the Kitchen section here.
Activities
While getting kids to interact with veggies for real and using their senses to explore them is best, encouraging hands off activities like arts & crafts, puzzles & games or at-home science experiments can be a great start, particularly for those who are fussier eaters or struggle with anything too sensory. Use these veg-themed activities as a stepping stone to interacting with the veg themselves. We have loads of crafty downloads here, puzzles here, and quirky science with veg here.
Sensory
Once you feel your child is ready to engage a little more, you can show them how to explore the veg you have on hand with their senses, coming up with playful silly descriptions of how a veg smells, feels, looks, sounds and perhaps even tastes. Find ideas, videos and some simple sensory education session ideas to get you started here.
Serving
The moments before food is offered can be a perfect opportunity for engagement that can help make it more likely a child will eat it! Giving children a sense of ownership in the meal can make a big difference to their feelings going into it and the pride they take in it. You know your child best, but if you aren’t sure where to start, we have some fun and simple ideas for easy roles you can give them in the serving process over here.
NEXT LEVEL
I Want To Improve My Stir Fry
If you are feeling confident with your favourite stir fry recipe, but you’re wondering if there are some small tweaks you could make for the better, this is for you.
We’ve outlined some simple stages for continually improving on a basic stir fry to get you from good to great. Find where you feel your current recipe sits and see if the next step is something you could aim for. You don’t have to go any further, but if you choose to, make sure you are feeling confident with this new stage before you try the next one.
And remember, the MOST important thing is that the family enjoys the meal! These changes and swaps can take as long as is needed if your family isn’t ready for big changes all in one go. Small simple improvements over time may not even be noticed.
Better Sauce
Read the labels on jars or pouches of sauce and make changes as slowly as needed for your family, gently moving them towards lower sugar, salt and fat options and ingredients you recognise.
If and when you feel ready, you could start making your own stir fry sauce. There are thousands of easy stir fry sauce recipes online, but you could start super simple with a mix of low salt soy sauce, minced ginger and minced garlic to keep things cheap and healthier than jarred sauces.
Frozen chopped ginger and garlic can be great ways to use just a small amount and keep plenty on hand for future stir fries without extra cost or wastage. If you want to add more, ingredients like sesame oil, rice vinegar, sliced chillies (fresh or frozen), honey or spice mixes like Chinese five spice can be useful and affordable additions.
Making meals go further
With food budgets being stretched, meat can be expensive. Using veg and pulses can help a meal go further without noticeably altering the taste and texture. This not only saves you money, it also helps you get a little closer to 5-a-day! Go at your pace and work through the stages to build up to 50% meat and 50% pulses/veg over time if you can.
For a stir fry, try swapping meat for tofu, or using a tin of chickpeas or black beans, drained, rinsed and added for the last couple of mins of cooking, or even a tin of cooked lentils if you prefer.
Add veg
Adding veg means adding bulk, vitamins and fibre, so you can fill up hungry bellies while making a favourite meal cheaper, more filling and healthier! For the best chance of success, start small (with a veg you know the family like if possible), add a little more each time, don’t try to hide it, and build up over time.
Aim for 2 handfuls of veg per person in the long-run, but it’s better to go slowly and get there eventually than to rush to the finish line and find no one is ready to get there with you.
- Start with frozen veg – there is less waste, it’s cheaper and easier to use a little more each time. A bag of stir fry veg is your best bet, but you could try mixed veg, frozen sliced peppers, mushrooms, peas, sweetcorn or chargrilled veg that can just be defrosted in the microwave and drained of any excess water before adding to the pan – this is one instance where frozen may not be best for texture though, as you want a bit of a crunch in a stir fry!
- If using fresh veg, the cheapest and easiest option is usually a bag of ready-mixed stir fry veg, but they can be heavy on the cabbage and beansprouts, so if you aren’t a fan of those or fancy a change, try buying 2-4 types of fresh veg that are good when barely fried and slice thinly. Great choices include: onions (red or spring work best), peppers, mushrooms, sweetcorn or baby sweetcorn, sugar snap peas or mangetout, carrots (slice thinly or use a veg peeler to get thin slices), tenderstem broccoli, beansprouts, asparagus, fennel, beans, leafy greens and finely shredded cabbage or brussels sprouts.
Don’t forget that the MOST important thing is that the family enjoys the meal! There’s no rush, and no pressure in not getting to 2 portions per serve.
Batch cooking
Once you are happy with your recipe, why not batch cook and freeze extra to save you future time, effort and money? While stir fry veg doesn’t freeze well, the sauces do! If you are going to the effort of making a great stir fry sauce, make a big batch and freeze in ice cube trays or small portions and keep in zip-lock bags or airtight containers in the freezer.
You could also double or triple batch rice – just make sure to cool it quickly after cooking (run under cold water in a sieve until cold and drained) then place cold in an airtight container or zip-lock bag and freeze straight away for a month or so, or 1-2 days in the fridge and reheat quickly to piping hot to serve.
Not sure if batch cooking is for you? People often think batch cooking means you have to have a big freezer and a slow cooker. But while those things can be helpful, they’re definitely not essential. Find out more about how to start small with batch cooking in our guide.
engaging kids
Play is essential!
Think of children helping in the kitchen as a role play game filled with fun for maximum effect. One of the best ways to develop a love of veg in kids is to get them involved in the prep of the veg. Not only is cooking an essential life skill for kids to learn, but it’s a great, fun way to get them engaging with healthy foods!
Cooking with kids
One of the best ways to develop a love of veg in kids is to get them involved in the prep of the veg. Not only is cooking an essential life skill for kids to learn, but it’s a great, fun way to get them engaging with healthy foods! They don’t have to be involved in the whole process especially when they are very young (let’s keep the mess to a minimum!), just give them 1-2 smaller jobs they can own with some supervision.
If you are making stir fry, why not get younger kids mixing up the sauce and chucking a couple of handfuls of your chosen veg into the pan. They could also help you serve and add extra toppings (see below).
Older kids might be ready to learn how to chop some fresh veg to add in, stir everything together in the pan, and make a stir fry sauce with your help!
See if they can tick off our Kitchen Ninja skills over time as you all get used to the recipe.
Arts & crafts
While getting kids to interact with veggies for real and using their senses to explore them is best, encouraging veg-based arts & crafts can be a great start, particularly for those who are fussier eaters or struggle with anything too sensory.
Use these arts & crafts as a stepping stone to interacting with the veg themselves. While you make your stir fry, why not set them up with our sweetcorn face mask?
Games & puzzles
Like arts & crafts, games & puzzles are a very safe way to get veggies to become more familiar and takes any pressure off eating or engaging their senses around veg for now.
A great place to start with stir fry might be our sweetcorn Top Secret code game!
Sensory
Sensory engagement with veg is possibly the best way to get children to slowly become more familiar with a veg. Take away the pressure to taste for now (and remember that ‘tasting’ could be expanded to include sniffing, licking and smelling) and instead encourage exploring a veg with a sense of smell, hearing, touch or sight.
Why not start with a couple of slices of mushroom and get them to describe what they see – does it remind them of anything? Maybe it looks like a strange mini face or a tiny grey pumpkin. See if they want to chuck some into the stir fry after having engaged with them.
Serving
If your kids aren’t ready to be in the kitchen helping with part of the prep or cooking process, why not give them a job around the serving that could help them feel involved in the meal?
A crafty kid may like to design a beautiful menu, one who likes to help can lay the table. One may like to help you plate up the food, another may love to give the meal a theme! If you can (and we know it’s not always possible), try to eat with the kids, as they are much more likely to eat healthier food if they see it being eaten (and enjoyed!) by their families.
Why not let your child be in charge of toppings? Let them choose from a few options such as: roughly chopped fresh herbs, chopped nuts, sliced spring onions, thinly sliced red onions “pickled” for a few mins in red wine vinegar and a pinch of salt and sugar, shredded lettuce or red cabbage, grated carrots or thinly sliced cucumber. Make sure to praise them for their choices as you tuck into your stir fry, it may encourage them to try some of theirs!
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