This stir fry dish take around 15 minutes to cook if your veg are chopped and ready to go. It’s made with a delicious lime and peanut sauce, tofu and a mix of veggies. It’s perfect for a quick, tasty and healthy dish.
It’s really helpful to have a few recipes up your sleeve that you can throw together in a few minutes when you don’t want to spend too long in the kitchen. This dish is one of those and it’s a really handy quick meal that is also delicious.
There are three main components to make this tasty stir fry:
The Stir Fry Sauce
To create an amazing flavour for this dish, I use the following ingredients:
- soy sauce
- maple syrup (or other sweetener)
- a lime
- peanut butter
- ginger
- coriander (cilantro) leaves – optional
I usually grate the ginger into the pan, but I have included it in the sauce ingredients as it’s helps to create the wonderful flavour.
Tofu
For this dish, I use tofu. There are various ways to prepare tofu, such as marinading it, pressing it to remove water and coating it in corn flour. Since this is a quick dish, I like to keep it simple and just cut the tofu into slices. Or what I have done for this dish, is used tofu that has already been sliced for use in dishes like this and has some flavour added. I find tofu prepared like this is available in most supermarkets.
I have also made this dish with tempeh, cutting it into bite sized pieces, and its been great.
The Veggies
For this dish there are so many options for vegetable combinations. I change the veggies every time I make this based on what I have available or want to use up. For this recipe I have gone with the following:
- red onion
- a red pepper
- a small head of broccoli
- bean sprouts
I start with onion each time and then like to vary the rest. You can try such things as spinach, bok choi, carrots, mangetout, baby sweetcorn, green beans or courgette. Mushrooms are also great. All in all you want about a pound (450g) of veggies.
One recommendation is if you purchase beansprouts, make sure you have a plan of how to use them in the next few days. I find they go bad very quickly.
How to Cook the Stir Fry
First get all your ingredients ready, and wash, peel and chop any veggies that you are using.
Next add some oil to a deep pan or wok, and once nice and hot, add the tofu and onion. Cook for two minutes on high and then add the rest of the veggies. Cook on quiet a high heat for another 3-4 minutes, tossing the pan regularly to keep the veg moving about.
While the veggies are cooking, prepare your sauce by adding the juice from one lime into a jug. Then add the peanut butter, the maple syrup and the soy sauce. Add around 4 tablespoons of water and then stir the sauce together until the peanut butter has dissolved and the sauce is smooth.
You can then thicken the sauce if you like but this is totally optional. If you wish to do so, add a tablespoon of corn flour to 2 tablespoons of cold water in a cup and stir until the corn flour is dissolved and you are left with a milk like fluid.
Add the milk like fluid to your sauce.
Then add the sauce to the veggie and cook on a medium heat for another five minutes.
Serve the stir fry with cooked rice or noodles.
15 Minute Veggie Tofu Stir Fry with Peanut Lime Sauce
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 red onion (small)
- 150 g bean sprouts
- 150 g broccoli florets
- 1 bell pepper
- 1 tbsp oil
- 200 g tofu
- 1 tbsp ginger (grated)
- 1 tbsp maple syrup
- 1 tbsp soy sauce (or tamari)
- 1 lime
- 150 g rice noodles
- 1.5 tbsp peanut butter
Instructions
- Put some water on the boil for the noodles
- Prepare the sauce by adding the peanut butter, maple syrup, lime juice and soy sauce to a container along with 4 tbsp of water. Stir until the peanut butter has dissolved and the sauce is smooth.
- Add the oil to a pan and bring to a high heat. Add the chopped onions and tofu and cook for 2 to 3 minutes, tossing regularly for even cooking.
- Add the rest of the veg including the fresh grated ginger and cook for another 3-4 minutes, tossing regularly.
- Get the noodles cooking in another saucepan, and cook according to the packet instructions.
- Add the sauce to the veggies and tofu and cook on a medium/high heat for anther 5 minutes.
- Once the noodles are cooked, drain and add to a bowl. Add the stir fry from the pan.
- Top with chopped coriander leaves for an extra flavour experience – optional
