You've defined Refrigerator Velcro for us before. :) I've saved your post because your approach. This is an area where I have trouble communicating with those who don't cook. Yours is very approachable!

I don't stir fry. I was told not to when I tried to learn how. :) That probably put me off, and I'd be better at it now, and I may be giving your outline a try, but maybe in a skillet on the induction.

My auntie used to just scramble anything leftover (likely doggie bags) with eggs. Including bone on spareribs. I'm more likely to unstick the velcro in a casserole or pudding.

I'm unable to post pictures from my iPhone. Even when loading the desktop version of the site. Odd.

But I'm at the computer now, so here are some: as you can see, it is all left over pizza toppings, veggie tray or salad ingredients.

Looking at this more closely, I guess these are basically a salad, except that stuff gets briefly sautéed.

Sugar pea, mushroom, pepper, bacon, scallion

Chicken, carmelized onion, artichoke heart, pepper, olive, carrot, jicama, spinach

sausage, pepper, celery, scallion, chicken stock - added slivered almonds later

Just the term "refrigerator velcro" made me curious. I thought you were cooking your door gasket?? Anyway, stir fry here is much as you describe, once a week more or less. I lean toward Asian seasonings as well, and most of the time serve over a bed of good ol' sticky rice.... dug through some photos and found a couple,

one with chicken...

one with steak...

Well, that all looks scrumptious! Don't call it "velcro" and no one will ever know. :)

Yum, those all look delicious to me. When I have leftover vegetables and etc, I tend to make fried rice, just because I really like fried rice. Of course, that means I have to cook rice, so your stir fry is a much better idea.

Annie

This just might put me over the edge on buying a rice cooker. I could have it going in the dining room. My kitchen is the tiniest thing you ever saw! Stir fry is one of my favorite foods, but I'm not very good at sauces. In fact, I'm terrible!

I will have to copy and paste your post. It's a great tutorial, and fun to read. Thanks.

I've only attempted stir fry a few times, and I only very loosely call it stir fry. I don't have a wok - well I do, but it's buried somewhere and completely covered in dust and grime. So, I use a skillet instead. I haven't thought of using 2 skillets. I usually use mushrooms, and some other veggies such as broccoli, scallions, celery, bell peppers, and maybe tofu. The last time I tried, I baked the tofu first, but way over cooked it, so it turned out like tofu jerky. I cooked the mushrooms first, set them aside, then cooked the veggies, then added the tofu, and returned the mushrooms to the skillet. I don't remember what I did for a sauce. It would probably have turned out okay if I hadn't have over cooked the tofu. I need to practice some more.

Sally

To me "stir fry" is not a recipe, it is a cooking technique, just like "deep fry", "roast", "bake", and "broil".

I like stir frying only one to three ingredients. The technique brings out the texture, color and flavor of the ingredients.

Any time you mix a lot of ingredients, you are basically making chop suey using the stir fry technique.

But don't disparage chop suey, if done properly, chop suey can be amazing. It's like a symphony of flavors, and textures, that proudly shows off the luxury of chromatic display. John's photos are good examples.

dcarch

John, I was having issues posting pics from my iPhone. The Houzz team advised me to email them to myself and save to my laptop desktop. Then hit the Photo icon and "select". This should enable you to choose the one you want to post. If this doesn't work, suggest you request their advice for your particular situation. They're very responsive.

No stir fry ideas, just enjoy perusing yours:)

John, I can't decide which one looks the yummiest, so I'll have a serving of each, please!

I'm definitely saving this post so I can try to copy them!

Rusty

I now can't even post comments using my iPhone. Not sure why, will contact Houzz.

Sorry ,I have to ask. What is refrigerator velcro? Leftovers? I tried google but got no where.

Dcarch's comment got me looking up chop suey, and here's an interesting tidbit from wiki:

Chop suey is widely believed to have been invented in America by Chinese Americans, but the anthropologist E.N. Anderson concludes that the dish is based on tsap seui (杂碎, “miscellaneous leftovers”), common in Taishan(Toisan), a county in Guangdong Province (Canton), the home of many early Chinese immigrants to the U.S.

Seems John's meals certainly qualify as tsap seui, no? Either way, they look great.

I've long toyed with the idea of getting one of those high BTU propane burners for wok cooking. There are no great setups for electric that I'm aware of, and taking it outside takes care of the ventilation and splatter all at once.

Glad to hear I'm not the only one with picture problems from my phone. It went from working great to working intermittently to not working at all. IMO that's a problem they should fix rather than tell us to email to ourselves, get on a desktop, etc.

I have one of those butane burners FOAS, I got it at a restaurant supply store when I was looking for something electric to use in my classroom for a canning demo. There really isn't an electric equivalent and the guy at the store said chef's use it for tableside cooking and demos and the off-gassing is minimal. I used it under the vented hood of the lab, lol! But I have since used it inside with no worries. It heats up stuff so fast it really doesn't have time to give off that much gas, and you can always open a window, whatever. I just LOVE mine. I love it. It is so easy to get out and put away and clean up too! I take it with me camping also. The only downside is you have to buy the special butane cans for it and you can't get those just anywhere. The burner itself is relatively cheap. They get you with the gas!

Debrak, it's JohnLiu's phrase for food stuff that sticks to the fridge (figuratively). Bits of this and ends of that. Things which combined can become good food. There's a previous thread.

I agree with making fried rice out of it. We do that with restaurant leftovers as well. And a rice cooker is, I have reluctantly come to admit, a timesaver. We're going back to the Panasonic; it's expensive and ours died so we tried a cheaper brand. Nowhere near as good; cooks faster but the rice doesn't taste as good. One of the few times my frugal spouse has said, "Yeah, let's dump this soon and buy the expensive one again."

Thank you plllog!