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Weeknight Dish: Stir-Fry

One night early in our relationship, I (the husband) went over for dinner at my wife’s apartment and saw something disturbing in her cabinet... a terrible pre-packaged stir-fry sauce!  We moved forward with using it for dinner that night, but as you can imagine, we did not end up enjoying the taste. After that night, I taught Kelly the basics of stir-fry as my dad taught it to me: use garlic, use ginger, throw in some vegetables, and you will have something fresh and delicious. Over the years we have tweaked and tinkered with that basic formula and have now settled on a recipe for homemade stir-fry sauce that we now eat almost every week!

Stir-Fry is an amazing tool in any couple’s cooking tool box. Do you have some broccoli, green beans,  and chicken left over from this weeks’ groceries? Boom! Stir-Fry it. How about some onions, spinach,  and shrimp? Done. Stir-Fry! 

Stir-Fry is a simple cooking technique that uses a wok, which gives you greater temperature ranges across the surface area and has a rounded shape that makes it much easier to toss the vegetables and have it all cook correctly. (Of course, you can also use a normal pan, but I have found it more difficult to get the desired results.) The great thing about this meal is you really can just throw all your ingredients into the wok, cook together on a high heat, and stir like crazy! Once your veggies and protein is cooked you can finish off your delicious meal with a sauce, like our own homemade stir-fry sauce, and serve over noodles or rice.

You can see our full stir-fry and homemade sauce recipe here, and I have included a few notes and recommendations below for you to read through so you can customize your meal to your liking! Enjoy!

Using hot sauce: The heat! We used Tapatio in the meal shown here, but I also really like using Chili-Garlic sauce or Sriracha. The way I have written this recipe it is actually a quite mild heat, so definitely play around with the amount of hot sauce to amp up the heat if you’d like- just be careful! A little goes a long way, so increase slowly not to over-spice.

Grated Ginger + Garlic: Oh man, the grated ginger is my favorite part of this sauce. It gives it a great kick and added flavor. Garlic is probably our most-used and favorite flavors in our household, so perhaps I should include warnings on future recipes to cut the garlic down a tad if you are not a garlic lover. But, we LOVE IT, and really enjoy the flavor combo of Garlic + Ginger for this sauce.

Honey: I’ve experiment with using sugar instead, but found it just too sweet. I recommend the more subtle natural sweet of the honey.

Corn Starch: The thickening agent. Be sure to whisk it well into the sauce to get a nice consistency when that sauce starts to simmer.

Lime: A bit of lime juice gives the sauce some acidity, and I think completes the flavor profile alongside the ginger and garlic.  

Sesame seeds: My wife likes sesame seeds. That is one of the beautiful things about cooking as a couple...sometimes you just do things because your partner likes it, and you don’t need any other reason.

Rice: I highly recommend using Sushi Rice since it is super sticky and really holds the sauce well. If you don’t have Sushi Rice any rice will work, and you can also experiment with using lo mein or other style noodles instead. Whatever makes you happy!

Cooking Chicken: You will notice that our recipe tells you to cook the chicken in a separate pan before adding it to the wok with the rest of the ingredients. I have found that cooking it this way keeps the chicken more moist and juicy compared to when I’ve cooked it together with the vegetables.

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Our NYC food tour

We are finally home after a 4-day weekend in NYC! We are exhausted from traveling and stuffed from all the delicious meals, but are so filled with love and gratitude for the time we had with family. Since you all weren’t there with us to experience our mini food tour, we are here to share some of the highlights and favorite moments of the weekend. We hope you ate something recently, because some of these pictures might make you REAL hungry.

We arrived Friday morning and, of course, our first stop was at a local Staten Island deli. For me, it was the typical corner deli/bagel shop experience I had growing up, but for my husband it was like a candy store. 

Trays of bagels line the walls behind the glass counter, which is filled with all sorts of delicious Italian deli staples like pasta salads, chicken cutlets, potato salads, fried eggplant, and more. A table of older men sit in the corner, reading the morning paper and discussing the history of certain organized crime happenings that I’d rather not discuss. Fugheddaboudit. Nick and I order our favorite bagels, egg everything with cream cheese, grab a couple drinks from the cooler, and are on our way. 

Perfect start to the weekend.

The adventures continued on Friday with lunch and dinner at places that were a first for both of us. About a 10 minute walk from Nonno’s house in the Windsor Terrace neighborhood of Brooklyn there is a small but mighty Chinese restaurant with a menu to match: East Wind Snack Shop. We read great reviews on the place and when Nick discovered the chef was featured on Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations (among other things), we knew we had to try it. The menu looked so great, we basically tried half of it! We started with a pork belly bao bun, followed by aged beef pot stickers, veggie dumplings, pork dumplings, and the vegetable spring rolls. All were amazing! The bao bun was Nick’s favorite, and I was obsessed with the pork dumplings (I even convinced Nick to give me the last one!) We had to round out the meal with the lemon sugar Hong Kong Hot Cakes for dessert, which were so fun to eat and weren’t too heavy after a large meal. 

For dinner, we decided to take the F train into Manhattan to try a rec from my dad, the famous John’s of Bleecker Street, for brick-oven pizza. The smell of the coal fired brick oven permeated the restaurant. The wooden booths, old-school photos, and head-shots of celebrities that have visited over the years made this place instantly feel a scene from a movie. We ordered a pie and some soda’s and spent the night laughing and enjoying an unexpected date-night. 

On Saturday we skipped our usual breakfast and opted for just a cup of coffee, knowing that we would regret not saving plenty of room for our lunch at Defonte’s Sandwich Shop. I’ve been going to Defonte’s since I was a kid because it is one of my dad’s favorite places from when he was growing up in Red Hook, the neighborhood in Brooklyn where Defonte’s is located. I would probably argue with anyone that this place makes the absolute best Italian sandwiches ever, but I have literally never found anyone who disagrees. My usual order is either a chicken or eggplant parm hero, but I decided to try something different this trip. I ordered a Golden Boy Special (fried chicken cutlet, vodka sauce, prosciutto, and fresh mozzarella) and Nick had the roast beef, fried eggplant, and fresh mozzarella hero. As expected they were both incredible, and I was happy to introduce my husband to Defonte’s, who usually is the one introducing me to new food!

To end our weekend food tour (and the weight gain that definitely went along with it!) we headed to meet my parents for lunch at L&B Spumoni Gardens on Monday. This is another place that I’ve been going to my whole life and, despite the fact that they have a full restaurant, I have never been able to order anything besides their signature Sicilian pizza (and maybe a rice ball parm on the side). My parents shared fun stories with us and we got a bit nostalgic reminiscing on what life was like before we all lived here in Florida (extra points for those who get the Billy Joel reference) over a half tray of Sicilian and a cup of rainbow spumoni. 

Being back in New York will always feel like coming home, but there is just something about sharing favorite meals with loved ones that amplifies the experience. I realized this weekend that some of my favorite places weren’t JUST my favorite because of the amazing food (which, let’s be real, it is all amazing) but also because of the memories associated with them- the graduation parties, the summer nights after a Mets game, the stop on the way home from a swim meet that didn’t go so well, the family picnic on the front stoop of your grandparents house after a day at the park, the Saturday morning after a sleepover at your house with your best friends. Good food has the ability to transport you- and that is exactly what happened to me this weekend. Thanks, NYC. Until next time!

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Next Stop: Home

Well, sort of. This weekend, Nick and I are heading to New York City for my cousin’s wedding and my nephew’s baptism. Although we’ve lived in Florida for just over a year now, I grew up on Staten Island and my parents grew up in Brooklyn, where my 95 year-old adorable Italian immigrant Nonno (grandfather!) still lives. Going back always feels like going home, and I’m looking forward to a weekend with family and our favorite FOOD spots! Stay tuned as Nick and I sample some of our go-to meals, like ‘real’ bagels, a half tray of L&B Sicilian, and a Defonte’s hero that is sure to make Nick cry (it will be his first time, and I can’t wait to document it). See you tomorrow, NYC!

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Humble Beginnings

Welcome! We are Kelly & Nick, a couple of newlyweds with a love for food and exploring our new life together. To us, food is more than just food. It is a way to nourish and support your body to feel healthy and strong. It is a way to provide comfort. It is a ticket to a country you have never been to before. It is a peek into a new culture. Most importantly, food is the way we show love and care for one another. Join us as we learn new recipe’s, perfect old ones, try new restaurants, and explore new cuisines. This is our life, documented through food. This is The Couple’s Dish.