cooking question and PICSPAM

[cornerofmadness]

First the question, for all the cooks on my flist, how do you prepare thin, quick-cooking beef as for a stir fry or fajita. I always manage to ruin it. I'm pretty good in the kitchen but this one stymies me.

Take tonight's sukiyaki. I started with thin cut braising beef then pounded it even flatter. Being that broken down it should have been tender as heck. I fried it only for a moment then added it to the sukiyaki. I'm beginning to think part of the problem is the Asian (and hispanic) sauces. I think that my med. rare beef parboils in a blink of an eye or something. Cook time less than 3 minutes and tonights beef the cats couldn't chew.

And now ICE STORM 2009 PICSPAM

Roy’s footprints frozen into the snow

The Icy Hills of Home

Japanese Lantern in Ice

THIS is what my car was trapped in. Poor Yukio

On the Way to Jackson

Winter Fairyland

Pines

Breaking under the Ice

Dogwoods (Jackson library)

I think this one is beautiful SERIOUSLY. It's my favorite. It's almost art. If you only click on one...

Roy back after two days in the snow



















http://dragcave.net/user/cornerofmadness

Comments

[ishte.livejournal.com]

Roy's footprints almost look like they crossed a pond in your yard. haha.. that dogwood though, it looks just like mine. Beautiful shot with the sun and all. Really nice.

On that beef thing... thin sliced... I stir fry it usually with a little fresh (or that fresh stuff in a bottle you know?) garlic and green onions in a little olive oil, in a WOK... maybe with a splash of soy sauce. I usually cut it into squares no bigger than about 2 inches... and should be no more than a quarter of an inch thick... an eighth if I can get it that thin. I stir fry it on medium to medium high temp, and try to keep it moving constantly. Once it's brown on both sides then I drop the temp to medium or medium low... add other veggies, like mushrooms carrots, broccoli (anything that needs a little cook time to get tender. Any sauce could be added now (like stir fry sauce? or more soy sauce if you like it salty. The temp is lower now, so I don't stir it quite as much, but I do keep it moving, flipping and turning everything about once every thirty seconds.

Certain veggies I don't add until the very last couple of minutes. Red and Green peppers should still be crunchy and their flavor self contained. Snow pea pods should be added in literally the last minute or two, and not more... they only want to get warmed up, because otherwise they get strong and that flavor permeates everything else and just ruins it.

Stir frying meat should seriously not take more than 7-10 minutes once you put it in the skillet. And that includes sauces and veggies. So it's super important to already have everything prepped and ready to go, so you can just add each ingredient as soon as it's time.

Hope that's helpful.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

sadly no. since that's what i usually do except I start the veggies first and the meat last since i barely cook it at all. sigh. I wonder why mine always comes out terrible

but thanks