Friday Recipe, Father’s Day Edition: Boys’ Night Beef Chow Fun!
June 17, 2011 | Written By: Healthy Schools Campaign
Here at HSC, our favorite recipes are ones that are healthy and a big hit with the kid crowd! Today we're featuring a fun, easy, veggie-filled recipe that got two thumbs up on a recent father-son boy's night. Happy Father's Day!
by Mark Bishop, Vice President of Policy and Communcations
Here’s the situation: one recent night, I got home at 6:04. My wife was on a business trip. My son Henry was getting home in 20 minutes. We had limited ingredients in the fridge and needed something quick, tasty, and fun.
Here’s what I spotted in the fridge: leftover steak (from dinner at my in-laws), a few carrots and a cucumber. I pulled together a few staples that I try to always have on hand: onions, whole grain pasta, garlic, soy sauce and rice wine vinegar.
With the materials at hand, dinner became a quick and easy version of beef chow fun.
Ingredients:
- 1 medium onion, sliced
- 3 cloves of garlic
- 2 medium carrots, shredded
- ½ cup low-sodium soy sauce
- ¼ cup brown sugar
- ¼ cup rice wine vinegar
- ½ pound sliced beef
- 1 tsp flour mixed in to a tbsp of water
- Pinch of red pepper
- Touch of powdered ginger
- ½ pound whole grain pasta
The process:
- First things first, slice your onions, dice your garlic, shred your carrots, and boil a pot of water.
- Add pasta to water and prepare according to package.
- Brown your garlic and onions. Add soy sauce, sugar, vinegar and red pepper, then mix. Bring to a light boil.
- Add the flour/water mix and stir to keep it from getting lumpy. You can also replace the brown sugar with honey or orange juice or can just use less if you prefer.
- Add beef and mix. Let it begin to cook. Add carrots and mix again.
- Add a little powdered ginger. If you want to get creative, add some nuts, some other veggies, maybe some chestnuts, or even some peanut butter. Experiment! This is improv cooking.
- When the pasta is ready, add to the beef and veggies and mix well.
The end result is sweet, tangy and a real kid pleaser. It has veggies, whole grains and protein without much oil. And a little meat really goes a long way in terms of flavor here. I was able to finish the prep and cooking in 21 minutes and had dinner ready to go. Henry gave me the double thumbs up on the meal!
