Chicken with Mixed Vegetables

Hi everyone. So my dad usually does our Chinese takeout recipes around here, but today I have one for you, chicken with mixed vegetables. This is a great way to kind of use up the odds and ends of vegetables in your fridge and to get lots of different vegetables into one meal.

Why You’ll Love This

This is a great way to kind of use up the odds and ends of vegetables in your fridge and to get lots of different vegetables into one meal.

I’m also gonna talk about how you get each vegetable in the dish to be perfectly cooked at the end.

I think that this is just like a really good way to use everyday vegetables that we can all get access to. And to make something really different and exciting with them.

Ingredients

• Marinated chicken
• Garlic
• Broccoli
• Mushrooms
• Peppers
• Carrots
• Onions
• Chicken stock
• Sesame oil
• Oyster sauce
• Soy sauce
• White pepper
• Shaoxing rice wine (or dry cooking sherry)
• Cornstarch slurry (cornstarch and water)
• Oil
• Water

Instructions

1. Blanch the broccoli and carrots for one minute in a wok of boiling water.
2. Use a strainer to take the broccoli and carrots out of the boiling water.
3. Add the chicken to the wok. Spread it out in one layer.
4. Take the chicken out.
5. Add a bit more oil.
6. Add the rest of the vegetables (mushrooms, peppers, and onions). Stir that around.
7. Add the wine because the wok does need deglazing.
8. Add the sauce. Toss around the sides of the wok to deglaze it.
9. With the sauce at a simmer, add the cornstarch slurry to thicken it. Stir it up because it’s been sitting and settled for a bit. Pour it in a little at a time because you might not need all of it.
10. Add the chicken back to the wok.
11. Add the vegetables (blanched broccoli and carrots). Stir.
12. If the sauce looks a little bit thick, add a little bit of water.
13. Adjust the cornstarch slurry accordingly based on how it’s looking.

Cooking Tips

I’m also gonna talk about how you get each vegetable in the dish to be perfectly cooked at the end. So that involves cooking them in slightly different orders and also pre, in the case of the broccoli and the carrots, the harder vegetables, pre blanching them before you stir fry them.

If you have lots of different vegetables in your stir fry, you kind of wanna make sure that they’re all cooked at exactly the right amount of time for that particular vegetable, based on how quickly or slowly it cooks.

The order of operations for this recipe is basically to first blanch the broccoli and carrots. That take the longest to cook. So I’m gonna precook those.

I like to blanch my broccoli whenever I use it in stir-fries. I think it gives you a lot more control over the cooking process to make sure that the broccoli is really properly cooked. And sometimes if you add it directly to stir-fry, it can take quite a bit longer than you think to cook through. And while the broccoli is cooking, you might end up overcooking other vegetables or other elements of the dish.

Shaoxing wine is a really key ingredient to a lot of our stir-fry dishes. If you’re wondering why your Chinese cooking or your Chinese stir-fries aren’t tasting like they taste at the restaurant, this ingredient is one likely culprit. This, when you deglaze the wok with this wine, it really creates that smoky flavor, that complexity in the sauce that’s really going to make your dishes taste a lot more like what you can get at a Chinese restaurant.

In a stir-fry of this sort, you’re going to want the onions to be crunchy and you’re going to want the onions to have more bite to them. So they’re actually going to cook for a much shorter amount of time and you’re going to kind of crunch down on some onion in addition to the crisp, tender broccoli and carrot and then crisp, tender peppers.

And then the mushrooms, you’re just going to want them to be nice and soft and cooked through. We’re not going to go about like caramelizing these mushrooms or anything like that.

You just kind of adjust the liquid versus the cornstarch. You can adjust the cornstarch slurry accordingly based on how it’s looking. And every stove is different. You’re going to get different levels of heat.

Serving Suggestions

And of course, serving with delicious white rice.

That’s it. A beautiful plate of chicken with mixed vegetables. Okay, with this tray, I’m feeling very like I’m in like an actual, I don’t know, retro takeout restaurant. Piece of chicken. Super juicy. Really good. Enjoy everyone.