Rosie Makes Stuffed Artichokes And A Shrimp/Bok Choy Stir Fry.

Last month, I made some terrific stuffed artichokes. Of course, the artichokes I had last month were nothing less than spectacular. For those of you who missed that post, I'm making the stuffed artichokes again. Sadly, my artichokes aren't anywhere near the size as the ones I found before; and for stuffing, use the largest artichokes you can find. Stuffing ingredients: tomato scallions garlic lemon zest parsley basil mint toasted bread (not shown) pink peppercorns (not shown) capers (not shown)

Here are the artichokes, rinsed and ready to be prepared.

Pull off the bottom leaves, cut off the stems, slice the tops, and cut straight across the tops of each leaf.

I have a little sherry and vermouth I'll be adding to the water.

Water, vermouth, and sherry halfway up the artichokes.

I added in some lemon and lime slices, brought the water to a boil, covered, and simmered for about 40 minutes, or until the leaves pull away easily.

I turned the artichokes upside down to drain. Of course, I had to have a scrape off one leaf or four, and I could definitely taste the citrus.

Carefully pull away the leaves from the center.

And scrape out the fuzzy choke, revealing the tender, almost-meaty heart. The leaves on this particular artichoke kind of fell off. Not a problem. Still good.

While my artichokes were cooking, I prepared the stuffing. I peeled one large tomato and chopped it ...

... along with minced garlic, sliced scallions, and chopped parsley, mint, and basil.

For my toasted bread crumbs, I'm using part of this loaf. It's Schwan's French Baguette, or Briquette, as Mr. Hawthorne calls it. I always have them in my freezer and all the Hawthornes love this bread. I pulled apart about 1/2 of the loaf, spread it on a sheet pan, and toasted until nicely browned.

I mixed the tomato, scallions, garlic, parsley, mint, and basil then added in about a tablespoon of pink peppercorns ...

... and a tablespoon of capers.

Mr. Hawthorne zested a lemon for me.

Right before stuffing the artichokes, I added in the toasted bread and tossed. If you add the bread ahead of time, it will get soggy.

The larger the artichoke, the better it is for stuffing I've found out. These kind of fell apart. But they were still wonderfully flavorful.

I served these with a small bowl of melted butter and lemon juice. AndcanIjesttellya? I love this stuffing. The flavors are fresh, crisp, bright and perfect with the artichoke. In fact, I love this stuffing so much Imonna hafta find something else to stuff with it. Now, on to the main meal - Shrimp Stir Fry.

From front left going clockwise: chopped celery chopped bok choy stalks chopped bok choy leaves chopped peppers onion wedges

The ingredients for my sauce, from left to right: Fish Sauce Sweet Chili Sauce Soy Sauce Ponzu Sauce Teriyaki Sauce And then I have the pink peppercorns and the capers which did NOT go into this sauce but did go into the artichoke stuffing. Usually Rosie doesn't make mistakes like this, so just imagine those two ingredients in my picture of the stuffing ingredients and not in this picture of the sauce ingredients.

First I heated my wok (medium high to high), poured in a couple of tablespoons of oil and heated, and added in whole garlic to flavor the oil.

Remember when wokking, add in first the ingredients that will take the longest to cook. In this case, the bok choy stalks went in ...

... along with the celery for about a 30-second stir fry.

Then I added the peppers ...

... and onions ...

... for another 30 seconds.

Finally the bok choy leaves went in, until just wilted.

The secret to stir frying is high heat. Toss in the vegetables, stir constantly, and cook very quickly. This way the veggies stay crisp and retain their beautiful colors. Remove the veggies to another bowl and cover while you cook whatever meat, in this case, shrimp.

I heated the pan up again, added more oil, added some more garlic cloves for a few seconds, then added the shrimp.

Toss and stir fry the shrimp, being careful not to overcook.

When the shrimp are still a bit on the translucent side ...

... pour in the cornstarch slurry - 2 TB cornstarch mixed with 2 TB cold water, constantly stirring ...

Then pour in the sauce: 1/4 cup soy sauce 1/4 cup Ponzu 1/4 cup Teriyaki Sauce 1/8 cup fish sauce 1/8 cup sweet chili sauce

Stir as the sauce thickens.

And add in the vegetables ...

... stirring to coat and serve immediately.

I served this with Jasmine rice. There were no leftovers. There's nothing like a well-done stir fry. The vegetables are crisp and crunchy. The meat is juicy and tender. And the lightly thickened sauce wraps its flavor around each morsel, complementing and accentuating the flavors of the meat and vegetables. Excellent meal.