So I told Josh we’d be going raw this summer. Fact is we usually do eat a lot of raw (or barely cooked) food in the summer, but it feels a bit different heading into the season of plenty with a two-year-old who’s still not very good at crunching carrot sticks, honestly doesn’t know what to do with a bowl of lettuce, and couldn’t care less about some crispy cucumber slices with a drizzle of white wine vinegar and a sprinkle of sea salt (a snack I personally think is divine). But we’ve got to start somewhere and somehow, and I figure the time is right.
Tonight we had stir-fry — or my improvised version of stir-fry anyway. It was really good and really easy (recipe follows), but best of all, Masher ate everything except one or two larger dark-green pieces of bok choy. It was at least the fourth time we’ve put mushrooms in front of him; he turned up his nose the first three times, but gobbled them down tonight. He’s still 50-50 on crunchy vegetables. Tonight he ate the snow peas, which were barely cooked, and asked for more, but then — when he was chewing probably his ninth or so — he spit it out and didn’t try any more. Previously he’s eaten a slice or two of cucumber and a thin celery or carrot stick, and one day he ate about 10 celery sticks in a row (must have been REALLY hungry), but I think it’s going to take a summer’s worth of repeated exposure to these things to make them regular and acceptable guests on his plate. Ideas? I tried carrot shavings once since we often make them for salad … That was a big-time no, but I should probably try them again!
St. Patty’s Day Stir-Fry (Eat Your Greens!)
- neutral high-heat oil (I used grapeseed)
- 1 onion (white or yellow), chopped
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 pound snow peas (or some other crunchy green vegetable), trimmed as necessary
- 2 heads bok choy (or 1 head of some other green cabbage), chopped
- 1 pound cremini mushrooms, trimmed and chopped
- ginger (minced fresh or just from your spice drawer)
- almond butter (or peanut, soynut, sunflower, etc.)
- good soy sauce
(As with most of my recipes, it doesn’t really matter exactly which vegetables you use here or how much of each, and you should season the stir-fry to your taste. You don’t need a wok to make stir-fry, and in fact — depending on what kind of stove you have — a big, high-side, flat-bottomed skillet may work better for you. Because I make a lot of food when I cook, I usually have to stir-fry in batches by vegetable, which helps to keep things from getting overcooked.) Before you start to cook, mix a heaping big spoonful of nut butter with about 3 Tbsps soy sauce in a cup, and set it aside. Heat about 4 Tbsps oil in pan on high heat, add onion, and cook for a few minutes until onion begins to go a bit soft. Add the chopped garlic and ginger (if you’re using fresh). Add the snow peas and cook for just a couple of minutes. Remove the snow peas and onions to a separate plate, keeping as much oil as possible in the pan. Add the bok choy and cook until the stems have softened just a little bit (usually about 3-4 mins.), then remove to separate plate. Add the mushrooms to the pan, which is probably almost dry by now, and cook until they start to let go of liquid (approx. 4 mins.). Then pour the rest of the veggies back into the pan, add the nut butter-soy sauce mixture, sprinkle on some dried ginger unless you used fresh ginger earlier, stir to combine and reheat, and serve your St. Patty’s Day stir-fry over rice to your favorite family members.
Sorry no photos — it looked to good to delay digging in!
