Chicken and Cashew Stir Fry

If you’re looking for a tried and tested chicken stir-fry, this recipe will tick all the boxes. It’s easy to prepare, easy to make. It tastes amazing and it has that pan-asian appeal that is neither strongly Thai or Chinese and yet, satisfies a hankering for that unmistakable umami of Asian cuisine. You don’t have to be kick-ass kitchen to nail this recipe and chances are you’ll have most of the ingredients already. This recipe has been in our family for many, many years and I think my sister first discovered it from a magazine or something. It’s hand written in my recipe book with many splotches and stains from use, upping the stakes in our family food mythology.

As with any stir-fry meal, if you don’t have access to a super-charged flame (which most of us don’t) and a wok, take care to saute the chicken and garlic in fairly small batches. If you cook too much at once, it will stew instead of brown. You can add chilli to this dish, it goes well; either fry up some sliced fresh chillies before the chicken, or add some minced chilli in a jar to the sauces. You could use roasted, unsalted cashews to save time, but they are quite nice when fried in a wok.

Chicken and Cashew Stir Fry Recipe

Ingredients:
1 tbs fish sauce
2 tbs oyster sauce
3 tbs stock/water
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 cup cashew nuts
4-5 garlic cloves, minced
500g chicken sliced
1/2 a red capsicum, sliced
1/2 x carrot, julienne
1 onion, sliced
handful of spring onions, sliced

Method:
Put fish sauce, oyster sauce, stock and sugar in a small bowl.
Dry fry the cashews in a hot wok. Put aside.
Cook up the garlic and chicken in batches, till chicken is lightly browned.
Throw everything back into the wok and add sauce, capsicum, carrot and onion.
Stir fry till cooked and serve with spring onions and cashews.