Quick Shrimp, Snow Peas and Asparagus

You know what I love?  Chinese take out.  You know who doesn't like Chinese take out?  The Indian guy I live with. So instead of dragging him out and making him watch me eat Chinese food,  I learned how to just make this dish at home.  And after a long day at work, QUICK is the name of the game.   This dish that took me 10 minutes give or take a few.  It's a quick shrimp stir fry.  After you make this, you'll see how easy it is to make and you might never get Chinese take out again!  Just kidding.  But seriously, this recipe makes double the amount you get at any reputable Chinese take out for half the price you'd pay at a restaurant.

You will need:
raw shrimp (I use frozen)
snow peas (cleaned)
asparagus
1 can of sliced water chestnuts
white wine or rice wine
soy sauce
crushed garlic
ginger
corn starch
oil
water or chicken stock

This dish cooks quickly so you'll want to have everything prepped and on deck. Like this:

I used about half this 12 oz bag of frozen shrimp.  This was a smaller sized shrimp, you can go as small or large as you want.  This bag was on sale for 5 bucks.  Works for me.  If you want more shrimp, then use the whole bag.  I wanted to save some for some kimchi shrimp pancakes that I'm making later this week so I didn't use the whole bag.  The beauty of this dish is that you can use a much or as little of the ingredients as you want.  Tonight, I was craving more veggies so I went easy on the shrimp.  You don't have to use snow peas or asparagus.  You can use onion, bell pepper and even mushrooms.  Any combo works great.

I didn't remember to defrost it so I just added it into bowl with enough water to cover it and let it sit while I prepped my veggies.  You can add a little bit of salt to the water if you want.  You don't have to, but I do.  If your shrimp is already defrosted, just put it into a bowl and set aside.

I used half a pound of snow peas.  I like to prep them by peeling off the stem and the spine.  See that brown tip, it's hard to eat so I just pinch it off and pull down the straight side of the snow pea.

You end up with this:

It takes me a few minutes to do the entire batch. You don't have to do this, but it makes eating easier.  Throw away your stems and spines.

Give your snow peas a nice rinse and set aside.

You don't have to use any other veggie besides snow peas, but I do.  It's completely up to you.

I like to also use asparagus.  I used about half this bag so about a pound of asparagus works.  Use more or less depending on how much veggie you want in this stir fry.

I wash my asparagus spears and cut about 1 and a half inches off the bottom.  I chop into one inch pieces.  If you had time, you could cut these pieces on an angle, but tonight I'm more interested in cooking quickly so I can eat!  Straight pieces it is then.

Remember your bowl of shrimp?  If you had it sitting in water, drain off the water.  Into the bowl of shrimp, add about 3/4 a cup of white wine.  If you have rice wine, that works but if you don't, regular white wine works too.  

I added about 3 tablespoons of soy sauce to my shrimp and wine.

Then a heaping tablespoon of corn starch.

Mix it all up and set aside.

If you have a wok, heat to medium high.  I didn't feel like dragging mine out so I used a large non-stick frying pan.  It works well too.  I added about 2 tablespoons of olive oil.

When the oil is nice and heated and swirls around easily in the pan, I add my chopped asparagus.  Basically, you want to add the veggies that take the longest to cook first.  So had I used bell peppers of large chopped onion, I would have added them in first.

A lot of recipes will have you add the garlic and ginger in first, and you can.  It's really not going to ruin the dish.  I just know that sometimes, I tend to burn the garlic if it goes into the hot pan so I'll drop the temp of the pan by adding some veggies in first.  Not rocket science. 

Stir fry your asparagus for a minute or so, then add 1 heaping tablespoon of fresh chopped garlic.

I didn't have any fresh ginger, but I had this chopped ginger paste on hand so I squeezed in about 1/2 of a tablespoon.  If using fresh, I would have added 1-2 teaspoons of finely minced ginger.  

Fresh = More flavor, so use less when using fresh.

After a quick saute, I added my shrimp, wine, soy and corn starch mix.

I also add my can of sliced water chestnuts now.

If the sauce thicken too much, you can add a few tablespoons of chicken stock or water.  I like to add the snow peas last, because I like them to crunchy and crisp.  Snow peas tend to cook quickly so I add them at the end so they spend the least amount of time in the stir fry.

I also like to add in a tablespoon of chili sauce, but this is optional.  When your shrimp is pink, you're done!  

That's it.  You're done.  Eat with rice or with noodles.  Serves four people.

Super easy to make and satisfying with it's ginger, garlic deliciousness.