Easy Bok Choy Stir Fry Recipe with Oyster Sauce
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Easy Bok Choy Recipe with Oyster Sauce: Quick and Healthy Asian Side Dish
This quick and healthy vegetable side dish is perfect for adding to your Asian-inspired meal. It's made with perfectly blanched bok choy, naturally sweetened with caramelized onions in a thick, rich, and savory oyster sauce. The whole dish comes together in less than 10 minutes!
What You Will Need
All you need is six ingredients and all of them can be found in any grocery store. No specialty Asian stores needed here.
Bok choy — Bok choy is a type of Chinese cabbage and sometimes labeled as pak choy, pak choi, pok choy, pok choi, and cải trắng in Asian grocery stores. There are big ones, medium ones and miniature ones. The ones I’m using were from Costco and they were labeled Shanghai/baby bok choy.
Raw bok choy. These were quit big even though they were labeled “baby bok choy” at Costco. I like to serve them in small wedges so all the ridges can hold the sauce.
I didn’t have a banana for a size comparison so here is a raw “baby” bok choy and my pudgy baby hand for you.
Bok choy has either a light green or white stems with dark green leafy tops. You can enjoy bok choy either raw in a salad or cooked in a stir-fry or soup, although the latter is more common in Asian cuisine.
When cooked, it has a mild, slightly sweet flavor and a crunchy texture. The leaf has a similar taste and texture to spinach and the stem has a similar taste and texture to cabbage.
The many varieties of bok choy are similar tasting so I use them interchangeably depending on what’s available.
Neutral oil — This recipe uses vegetable oil for stir-frying. You can also use other neutral-tasting oil such as canola oil, peanut oil, corn oil and sunflower oil. These oils can withstand high heat, making it perfect for stir-frying in Asian cooking.
Onions — Onions provide aroma and a natural sweetness to the dish once it’s cooked down. I’m using a small bulb of yellow onion in this recipe. Peel and cut into wedges, then sear in the oil to bring out its aroma and sweetness before adding the bok choy. You can also replace the onions with garlic or use a combination of onions and garlic.
Oyster sauce — Oyster sauce is the “salt” and our main flavoring agent in this recipe. Oyster sauce is a thick, dark sauce made from oyster extracts, soy sauce, sugar, and salt. It has a sweet and savory flavor and is commonly used in Chinese and Southeast Asian cuisine.
There are many brands of oyster sauce. Some are saltier than others. My favorite is Lee Kum Kee Premium oyster sauce. It’s a tad more expensive than the more well known Panda brand, but it’s not as salty and has a more well-rounded umami flavor. To make this vegetarian, use mushroom or vegetarian oyster sauce instead.
Water — Water is needed to dilute the oyster sauce. You can also use any type of stock to add more flavor to the dish such as chicken, beef, vegetable, and even bone broth.
Tapioca starch — This starch is used as a thickener and will turn the sauce into a gravy. It’s made from the cassava plant and has a neutral flavor. Tapioca starch is the thickener of choice in many Asian households and always in my pantry.
My go-to oyster sauce and tapioca starch
How to Make It
Step 1: Make the sauce. In a small bowl, whisk together the oyster sauce with room temperature water/ stock and tapioca starch until completely dissolved. Set aside.
Step 2: Cut and wash the bok choy. I like to keep my bok choy in wedges rather than separating all the stems but you can do it either way. To slice into wedges, slice the bok choy in half lengthwise. If it's still too big, halve it again. This will expose the nooks and crannies in the thick stems where dirt like to hide. Soak the bok choy in plenty of water to dislodge the dirt then give it a good rub down. Drain and set aside.
Step 3: Blanch the bok choy. Bring a tall skillet to a boil. Add bok choy and blanch for 3 minutes. Remove from water. Blanching quickly and evenly cooks the bok choy without too much tossing. It also yields a much better texture by removing a lot of the excess water.
Step 4: Stir fry everything together. Heat vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add onions and stir-fry until fragrant and lightly charred. Add the sauce mixture and cook until it thickens. Lastly, add blanched bok choy and toss until evenly coated and serve.
Make it into a Meal
Serve it with rice or noodles and one of these other dishes for a complete meal:
Crispy Salt & Pepper Beef
Air Fried Char Siu Chicken Wings
Vietnamese Ginger Chicken
Crispy Roast Pork Belly with Air Fryer
Vietnamese Fried Tofu & Pork in Tomato Sauce
Easy Bok Choy Recipe with Oyster Sauce: Quick and Healthy Asian Side Dish
Easy Bok Choy Stir Fry Recipe with Oyster Sauce
Ingredients
Instructions
- Cut the bok choy in half lengthwise. Halve it again if it's too big. Submerge the bok choy in water to clean then rinse thoroughly. Peel the onion and cut it into medium wedges.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the water, oyster sauce, and tapioca starch until smooth.
- Fill a tall pan or wok with plenty of water (about 1-½ quarts) and bring it to a rolling boil. Add bok choy and blanch for 3 minutes, tossing for even cooking. Remove the bok choy from the water and set aside.
- Drain the pan and wipe dry. Add oil and heat on medium-high. Add the onions and stir-fry them until lightly charred on the outside (about 3 minutes).
- Give the sauce mixture a stir in case the tapioca starch has settled. Pour the sauce into the pan. It should thicken almost immediately. Add the blanched bok choy and toss to combine with the sauce. There's no need to cook it any further. Serve it with rice or noodles for a complete meal.
Notes
- Can substitute water with any type of store-bought stock or bone broth for a more flavorful sauce.
- Can substitute vegetable oil with other neutral oils: peanut, canola or sunflower.
- Can substitute tapioca starch with corn starch or potato starch.
Nutrition Facts
Calories
64Fat
4 gSat. Fat
1 gCarbs
7 gFiber
2 gNet carbs
5 gSugar
3 gProtein
2 gSodium
322 mgCholesterol
0 mgThe values provided should be considered estimates. Factors such as brands purchased, natural variations in fresh ingredients, etc. will change the nutritional information in any recipe. To obtain accurate nutritional information for a recipe, use your preferred nutrition calculator to determine nutritional information with the actual ingredients and quantities used.
