Szechuan Pork Stir-Fry
with green beans and carrots / quinoa
This spicy Szechuan stir-fry that was first featured in 2018 is quick and easy but packed with flavor. Feel free to adjust the spice to your preference, or leave the spice out completely - the sauce has plenty of flavor even without it.
Ingredients
- Ginger - 2 tsp, grated
- Garlic - 2 cloves, chopped
- Stock, any low-sodium variety - 1/2 cup (sub water)
- Tamari - 1/4 cup
- Cornstarch - 1 Tbsp
- Brown sugar - 1 Tbsp
- Vinegar, rice - 2 Tbsp
- Oil, toasted sesame - 2 Tbsp
- Chili garlic sauce - 1 tsp, more to taste (sub any hot sauce)
- Green beans - 1 lb, sliced into 1” / 2.5 cm
- Carrots - 12 oz, thinly sliced
- Cilantro - 2 tsp , leaves chopped
- Oil, cooking - 1 Tbsp + 1 Tbsp
- Stock, any low-sodium variety - 3 Tbsp (sub water)
- Pork, ground - 1 lb
- Lime juice - 2 tsp
- Quinoa, uncooked - 2/3 cup
- Stock, any type - 1 1/3 cup
Nutrition Facts
Prep
- Quinoa - (Skip if quinoa was made ahead for Monday.) Combine quinoa with stock in a saucepan. Add some salt. Bring to a boil covered. Lower heat, keep covered, and cook until liquid is absorbed, 8 to 10 minutes. (Can be done up to 5 days ahead)
- Ginger / Garlic / Green beans / Carrots - Prep as directed. Combine ginger and garlic. Combine green beans and carrots in another container. (Can be done up to 5 days ahead)
- Cilantro - Chop cilantro.
- Make sauce - Combine ginger, garlic, stock (portion for sauce), Tamari, cornstarch, brown sugar, vinegar, toasted sesame oil, and chili garlic sauce. (Can be done up to 5 days ahead)
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Make
- Heat a large wok over medium-high heat. Add first part of cooking oil and then green beans and carrots with a pinch of salt. Saute until vegetables are bright and starting to brown in spots, 3 to 4 minutes. Add stock (portion for stir-fry) and cover pan with a lid or foil. Simmer vegetables until nearly tender, ~2 minutes. Remove cover and continue to saute until liquid is cooked off. Season with some salt or add some chili garlic sauce (not in ingredients list for stir-fry) if you’d like it to have a bit of spice.
- Set vegetables aside and return wok to medium-high heat.
- Add second part of cooking oil and then pork. Saute, breaking pork apart, until cooked through, ~5 minutes. Drain any excess grease off the pork.
- Add sauce to pork and simmer until sauce thickens slightly and coats pork, ~1 minute more. Add vegetable back in and stir to combine with sauce.
- If quinoa was made ahead, reheat in the microwave.
- Serve pork and vegetables over quinoa. Top with cilantro and lime juice. Enjoy!
Nutrition Facts
Reviews
Ratings
46 reviews
Definitely would make it again. Good flavor! Note: don’t use frozen green beans! It’s all I had. Fun activity with kids. Took a bit longer than planned. Sauce was meh for me and hubby loved it.
0 HelpfulMaybe it was not using enough sesame oil (I ran out) or the pork was starting to go bad, but the flavor seemed a bit off. Added sesame seeds to make up for the lack of sesame.
0 HelpfulSo good! Easy to make after a bit of practice. We actually subbed shrimp and loved it. I used frozen wonton wrappers (leftover from last time), but they were harder to work with. Next time I'll just double the recipe and freeze the potstickers.
0 HelpfulThese were frustrating to make (they stuck to the pan.. to be fair, my stove is.. aggressive) but they were very tasty regardless. I had to remake the sauce after burning the first one - it seemed to never thicken so I waited and waited. Cooked it way too long - a brief simmer will do.
0 HelpfulWe made this with ground lamb. We also cooked the lamb before making the potstickers. It was still great!
0 Helpful