merlinofchaos | These boots were made for wokin

Taking a cue from Alton Brown, I tried an experiment. Oh it was lovely. I got brocolli beef that tasted, to me, just like it came from a good Chinese restaurant.

I'm using my wok on my grill, where I can really put some heat under the thing. The cool thing is that with that *much* heat, it cooks very quick--I think this dish takes about 3 minutes from the time the meat hits the wok to the time it was ready.

I started with a little less than a pound of flank steak. Sliced across the grain, diagonally to make the strips a little wider.

I marinated them in the combination of a tablespoon of canola oil, a tablespoon of soy, two tablespoons of water, a tablespoon of cornstarch and a small piece of diced fresh ginger. I'd say it was probably about a teaspoon once it was diced. I left that in the fridge for several hours.

Because the wok cooks so fast, everything had to be prepped and ready to go ahead of time. Therefore, I had:

1 bowl with the meat.
1 bowl with the broccoli florets--I used two smallish stalks, I should've used 3.
1 bowl with the sauce: 2 tbs oyster sauce (I used kikkoman) 1 tbs soy, 1 tbs rice win (I used mirin because I have it), 1 tbs corn starch.
1 bowl with the flavorings: 4 or 5 cloves of garlic, which I'd run through a press. A handfull or so of sliced green onions, and more diced ginger--this is where I put too much. To get the cornstarch to fully dissolve I had to use my little hand blender.
1 bowl with the oil. I used mostly canola oil, flavored iwth some peanut oil and sesame oil.

Cooking:

The wok went over the grill with the most flame I could give it. I let it get hot and put the oil it. It crackled pleasantly; I waited until it quieted down and with some trepidation I put in the meat. It did not splatter all over me, but it did sizzle quite well. This is where 'stir fry' becomes important, because you must keep it moving. Cooked for about a minute and a half.

Next went in the bowl of flavorings. Stirred and cooked for 10 or 15 seconds.

Next went in the brocolli. Stirred, cooked in the remains of the oil and whatnot for about 15 seconds.

Then I added the sauce. stirred, kept cooking for another minute or so. Served.

Notes: Like real wok cooking, it does take quite a bit of oil. I will experiment to see if I can get away with less or not.

This is so quick to cook that if I prep the food ahead of time and leave it in the fridge, I could easily do this for lunch or for a fast dinner.

It's hard to feed a lot of people--I couldn't fit much more in the wok. However, it cooks so fast that I could prepare several dishes and cook them all in succession.