Beef in Orange Sauce

Your stir fry is only as good as it's sauce, so really the recipes I am sharing here are sauce recipes. I like a lot of sauce in my stir fry. Adjust the amount of sauce used to your taste. This sauce is good with beef, chicken and shrimp.

This sauce uses sesame oil. look for Japanese toasted sesame oil in the asian section of your grocery store, or check out your local asian market (more about those next time.) I like the taste of white wine vinegar in Chinese sauces, but any kind will work. Use any veggies you like. For really quick dinners use a frozen stir fry mix. Poke a hole in the bag and microwave for a minute to thaw the veggies a bit. If using fresh veggies cut them in uniform size, but larger than you would for a soup or stew. Remember to add your fresh veggies in order of hardness, Carrots, broccoli stems first, then beans, peas and last broccoli flowers and zucchinis. The beef I used is thinly sliced round roast. I buy them on sale and ask my butcher to slice them as thin as he can. Then I freeze the slices in 1 lb chunks( 4-5 servings)and add 2 tsp soy sauce before I seal the bag. If you do not own a wok you can use a large frying pan, cast iron is best, but you will need to cook half at a time, or only make a half recipe.

Orange-Sesame Sauce

1/2 C orange juice

1/4 C chicken broth

1/4 C soy sauce

2T sesame oil

3T brown sugar

3T white wine vinegar

1/2 tsp ginger

1T cornstarch

Mix ingredients together and set aside.

Prepare 1 lb assorted vegetables of your choice plus 1 onion sliced and 3 minced garlic cloves. Drain 1lb sliced beef that has beef marinated in 2 tsp soy sauce.

Heat a wok or a large frying pan on high heat. Add 1T peanut or other vegetable oil. When oil is hot add onion. Stir constantly. As onion starts to brown add beef. Continue to swish food around in wok as you add vegetables. Add vegetbles one kind at a time ( if using frozen add all at once) until they begin to soften. Pour in sauce and bring to a boil. Serve over warm rice. serves 4-6.

Why Order Take Out?

Chinese food has to be one of my favorite cuisines. I do not think I am alone. I am however one of the few people in my circle of acquaintances who makes Chinese at home regularly. I think the strange ingredients scare some people away, and others are not aware that you can make Chinese at home that tastes as good as the take out place around the corner. It's cheep, and lightning quick, and dare I say it good for you. Imagine that. So as I service to all my friends and family who have requested, I will share my secrets with you starting with Beef in Orange sauce. This one is easy, requires only one specialty ingredient and is reminiscent of the Orange Chicken sauce at Panda ( I will give you the recipe for that one later).

Happy Birthday Bubba

Today isBubba's 10thbirthday. He was the best Mother's Day present ever. He was born almost 6 weeks early, but he came at the perfect time. My dad was here in Utah on business and got to stop by the hospital to see him and take pictures home to Sweden. He was a beautiful baby with a round face and big blue eyes. We named him Oliver Riley. Oliver is such a serious name, so he was Riley, but mostly Bubba. He was born on a Saturday morning, and we brought him home on Mother's Day. As you can see he has always had an infectious grin. We have missed that grin over the past year, and are so glad he is feeling better and starting to grin again.

We had many great adventures together, that first year. We would walk all over downtown, and when the weather was bad, inside the brand new Conference Center or in the Crossroads mall. Once we even got locked in the bathroom together. He was only about 5 months old when I got sick. We would lie in bed most of the day and when we were tired of the bed we would move to the couch. I was relieved to find out I wasn't dying, just pregnant again.

On the day Erik was born Bubba stayed with Mor Mor and Mor far. At 13 months old he had never spent more than an hour or 2 away from us and was still breast-feeding. When they brought him to the hospital he crawled up onto the bed, slapped my face, slid off the bed and was ready to go home with Mor far.

As a baby he was very vocal. He would babble ad goo every waking moment. He still does. The only time he doesn't talk while he is awake is when he is reading. Luckily he likes to do that a lot.

I think he looks more like the Sorensen side of the family. he could be twins with some of his cousins, but there are pictures of my dad as a kid that look like Bubba, so maybe he is a good mix. His personality is mostly Chris. One day he was in big trouble. I put him in time out on a chair, but he was still bugging and getting into things from his chair so I moved it to the back of the kitchen where the door opened out into the backyard, and then went down the stairs to the basement. He cried and cried because someone could open the back door and knock his chair down the stars to the basement. I told him the door was locked so he was safe, but he was sure he was going to die. a couple hours later Chris came home and saw the chair. His first words were "Wow that looks dangerous someone could open that door and knock the chair down the stairs."

It's hard to imagine we are half way done parenting him, it has gone so fast. Before we know it he will be on his own, and I will be showing his kids the Mona-Bubba.