Tuesday night dinner!

I love stir fries (and basically any form of Asian food) so cook them a lot for our evening meals. They are healthy, filling and a great way to pack in loads of veg. As you will have noticed from previous posts I am from the 'chuck in what's in the fridge' school of cooking.

I always keep a packet of raw prawns in the freezer (you can buy them already frozen or freeze your own if you have a great local fishmonger). Using prawns as the base you can add whatever vegetables you have handy. If I've got one I'll always start with an aubergine because I think it takes on the flavours for a stir fry amazingly well, it does need to be cooked through though so add to the pan first. If you're hungry or want to stretch the meal out I'd also add some rice noodles or cold cooked rice - this route is also very good with an egg or two added.

Tonight's version is prawns, various vegetables and rice noodles (we'd run out of eggs) with enough for a meal for two and packed lunches the next day. Now I must admit to using a bit of ready made sauce but I am of the opinion than life is too short to be obsessive over staying clean and lean. I want a healthy new way of life, not a diet I feel I must stick to very prescriptive guidelines. Obviously if you are being super strict you can easily make your own sauces.

Prawn and vegetable stir fry with rice noodles

Ingredients:

200g rice noodles, cooked according to packet instructions and cooled

250g frozen, raw prawns

1 aubergine

1 red pepper

1 pack button mushrooms

2 pak choi

Very large thumb size piece of fresh ginger, peeled

2 red chillies

4 large cloves of garlic

5/6 spring onions thickly sliced

Bunch of fresh coriander - stalks finely chopped and leaves torn or roughly chopped

Shaoxing wine

Rice vinegar (preferably white)

Soy sauce

Fish sauce

Chilli sauce - I use Lee Kum Kee 'Chilli Garlic Sauce'

Juice of 1 lime

Dried chilli flakes

Chinese five spice

Sichuan pepper

Coconut oil

Method:

Chop all your veg before you start cooking, stir frying is too quick to be chopping as you go. I always chop the ginger, chilli and garlic very finely. I chop the aubergine into small cubes then slice the red pepper, quarter the mushrooms and slice up the pak choi reserving the leaves separately.
Once you have all the veg chopped heat some coconut oil in a wok until it's smoking hot, add your aubergine, ginger, chilli and garlic.
Fry off for about a minute then add a good slosh of shaoxing wine, rice vinegar, soy and a couple of shakes of fish sauce - I would guess I use about a tablespoon or two of wine, vinegar and soy with a teaspoon of fish sauce.
Cook until the aubergine has softened as the last thing you want is crunchy aubergine in your stir fry, the aubergine will probably absorb most of the liquid.
Once the aubergine is soft add the strips of red pepper and the mushrooms, fry off for a couple of minutes then add the frozen prawns, pack choi (white part only for now), chilli flakes, chinese five spice and some finely chopped coriander stalks.
Keep stir frying, once the prawns are defrosted add the noodles with a splash more soy and the chilli sauce and heat through, at this point you should also add the pak choi leaves and spring onions.
Take off the heat, stir everything through, add the lime juice and coriander leaves reserving a few for on the top.
Dish up into bowls and/or lunch boxes, top with the reserved coriander and crushed sichuan pepper (I use a pepper grinder for this because I add it to lots of things but a pestle and mortar will work equally well). Tuck in!