by Cristy Hebert

Created on: November 02, 2008

I don't have much time to cook on weekdays but I prefer eating home cooked meals with fresh vegetables instead of going the usual route of take-out/delivery/restaurants/frozen meals that are the quick fix for weekday meals. I bought a simple recipe book recently and I found an incredible recipe that is so simple and great tasting that I made it quite a couple of times ever since. The cookbook is marketed for women who want to lose weight sensibly, la Weight Watchers, so they offer recipes that are quick to make and are simple, easy and quick to make. On top of things, they only need 4 or 5 ingredients that you usually find in your refrigerator. This recipe uses fresh ginger root. This is an ingredient that people don't use often. It is not pretty well known in our kitchens. We eat it when we eat out in restaurants but almost forget it when comes time to prepare food for ourselves. Asians use ginger frequently in their cuisine but we North Americans are starting to discover it. It is a great tasting ingredient and, on top of it, it costs almost next to nothing which is a great thing!

If you have a wok, you will find that this recipe is incredibly easy to make but any old skillet will do.

Here are the ingredients:

fresh ginger root: You buy fresh ginger root. You cut the peel off it. You take a cheese grinder and you grind it. The quantity is up to you. Ginger is so cheap that it usually costs around 50 cents for one person worth. If you do the recipe for 2 persons, go all out and spend a whole dollar on fresh ginger root:)

fresh vegetables: mushrooms, peppers, shallots, carrot sticks, bean sprouts, zucchinis...any fresh vegetables will do.

meat: I have a preference for pork, but you can use beef or chicken.

sauce: soy sauce, rice vinegar and chicken broth or water.

You start off with shallots, you can add garlic but I don't because I can't digest it, and your fresh ginger. You cook them in olive oil for a few minutes and you add your vegetables and meat. You cook everything for a couple of minutes. Since I like my vegetables crispy, I cut my meat in pieces beforehand and I only need to cook everything a couple of minutes. When you feel that everything is almost ready, you add around 2 tablespoons worth of those 3 things: soy sauce/rice vinegar/chicken broth. You let them simmer a bit and add the bean sprouts at the last minute. You blend everything together and you are ready to serve.

It is an excellent recipe that takes around 10 minutes to prepare and 10 minutes to make. It is the perfect recipe for a weekday and you make it with an ingredient we are not used to...ginger root.

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