Sunday, January 9, 2011

Vegetarian Stir-fry

Vegetarian Stir-fry
Home Cooking



A while ago, Byron bought this weird can of vegetarian abalone. I thought he was crazy. We didn't end up using it for whatever he wanted to make that time and the can sat in the pantry, unloved, for a long while.



It ended up traveling with us to Toowoomba and we finally found a use for it. I say 'we' but it was really his own little food project.



Something that is meant to make life easy shouldn't be so hard

The opening of the can was an adventure in itself because Byron couldn't figure out how the electric can opener works.

Ragged can edges

The can was opened in the end but judging by the dangerous, ragged edges, I somehow think that we didn't quite do it the way it was meant to be done.

Contents of the can... unappetizing?

We picked up some veggies from the grocery store and came home to transform them into something edible. I was given a new electric fry pan so we wanted to give that a whirl too.


Vegetarian Stir-fry
Serves 2-3

Ingredients:
  • 1 onion, sliced
  • 1 zucchini, sliced
  • 1 squash, sliced
  • 1 red capsicum, sliced
  • 1 can of vegetarian abalone
  • ~ 3 tbsp oyster sauce
  • 1 tbsp chili bean sauce
  • 1 tsp sugar
Procedure:

1. Heat up some oil in a frying pan or wok on high heat. Stir-fry the vegetables, constantly tossing them around to cook evenly.2. Add the oyster sauce, chili bean sauce and sugar.
3. Taste and adjust the flavoring as necessary.
4. Serve immediately with steamed rice.


I must say, I had my doubts about this dish but it was really tasty and flavorsome. Those weird 'abalone' balls just soak up flavor. I suppose they must be soy-based like tofu. They're flavor sponges!


The other veggies not only lended color to the dish but also worked as a good flavor combination. The best thing about all vegetable dishes is that you feel healthy eating it.


I saved some for left overs the next day and it was still good.

4 comments:

  1. Mock Abalone = Fried Gluten

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  2. I really like gluten-based vegetarian mock meat... but usually the canned ones are full of flavour already, soaking in that salty sauce (note the sodium content!), so it's more like the mock meat gives the dish flavour rather than vice versa...

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  3. Hi Bonnie...

    I didn't even think about the sodium content! But of course you're right. The canned stuff already has a bit of its own flavor and in this case, they tried to make it seafood-like to simulate abalone.

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