Easy Vegetarian Stir Fry-Moscow Mule Style

Stir fries are delicate meals. I won't even pretend to insinuate that I have them perfected but I have learned quite a bit from absolutely butchering them in the past. Too much time in the wok and they turn into a mushy mess, too little and the veggies are too woody and raw to be enjoyed. It's the perfect combination of high heat and constant motion that makes for a good stir fry. You also have to take into consideration the nature and makeup of the ingredients. Some ingredients cook faster and thus go in at the end.

I whipped this one up with some leftover farmers market veggies that I needed to use up. I had also been drinking moscow mules the weekend before and had some leftover ginger beer, so this is a sort of bastardized, vegetarian orange chicken. It turned out pretty good.

What ya need:

• 1 knob ginger, approx. 1 cm cube, crushed
• 4 gloves garlic, minced until near puree
• 1 bell pepper, cut into strips
• 1/2 a red onion, cut into slices
• 1 1/2 cups sliced button mushroom
• 1 cup matchsticked carrots (mine were a little bigger, would recommend smaller)
• 1 lime, cut into 1/4ths 
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons ginger beer
• 1 teaspoon rice wine vinegar
• 1/2 table spoon corn starch 
• 1 jalapeno, seeds and pith removed, diced
• optional: 1 teaspon fish sauce, 1/2 tablespoon oyster sauce,  finely sliced thai basil
• Brown rice, quinoa, whatever grain you like
• 1/2 tablespoon coconut, olive, canola oil whatever you prefer

Directions

1. Chop all the veg. Try and make them uniform in size. This while ensure even cooking. I use a mortar and pestle to grind my garlic and ginger, but a fine dice is totally okay. Make quinoa or rice, set a side. 
2. Heat up the oil until roaring hot in a wok, or large frying pan with tall sides. 
3. Throw in carrots with about half the ginger and a squeeze of lime, stir until the lose a little bit of their firmness on high heat approx 3-4 minutes. 
4. Toss in sliced onion, pepper, jalapeno, mushrooms, garlic and ginger, toss on high heat until veggies soften but are still crisp to the bite approx. 2-3 minutes. 
5. Put in soy sauce, rice wine vinegar and the juice of half a lime. Also add the ginger beer. Keep on high heat for approx. 1 minute while stirring. (Optional: add fish sauce or oyster sauce now if you have it. I ran out)
6. Season with salt and pepper, and add cornstarch while stirring, The small amount of sauce in the pan should thicken. 
7. Serve immediately over quinoa or rice with sriracha and a wedge of lime. 

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