35 Stir Fry Recipes To Add Some Sizzle To Your Supper

Stir fries are excellent recipes to have in your dinnertime repertoire. Quick and easy by their very definition, stir fries usually also have the added bonus of including all of your macronutrients — carbs, fats, and protein — in a quick, one-pan dish.

But aside from these main commonalities, stir fries can also boast a host of different flavors and textures. From veggie-forward medleys to old takeout standards like beef and broccoli, the world of stir fry recipes is vast and ripe for discovery.

The secret to success with any stir fry recipe is prep work. Be sure to assemble your mise en place in advance, slicing and dicing all of your ingredients before you even heat your pan or wok. This way, you'll be able to add your ingredients in order without taking any time away from the pan and risking burning all of the lovely ingredients you've already started cooking. Now that you've got that pro tip, let's jump into these delicious stir fry recipes.

This chicken stir fry unites boneless, skinless chicken breast and a host of veggies in a sweet and savory sauce made with cider vinegar, brown sugar, garlic, and ginger. Like many stir fry sauces, it's thickened with cornstarch, making it rich and silky smooth. This stir fry is delicious on its own, but it's even tastier served over a starchy base to soak up all the extra sauce. Brown or white rice or rice noodles are all great options.

Recipe: Chicken Stir Fry

Beef and broccoli is a Chinese takeout staple, and it's not hard to see why. Rich, soy-marinated beef and tender, nutty broccoli florets are stir-fried in a sweet yet earthy sauce made with mirin, garlic, ginger, and honey. A touch of lime juice and a sprinkling of sesame seeds finish this dish off wonderfully.

Take care not to overcook the meat for this dish, lest it become tough. A quick sear at the beginning is all it needs — it will finish cooking by the time you've finished steaming the broccoli in the sauce.

Recipe: Beef and Broccoli

If you like beef and broccoli, you'll love this recipe, which unites the classic flavors of the takeout favorite with lo mein noodles. Lo mein is just one of many types of Chinese noodle, and while etymologically of similar origin, lo mein is distinct from Japanese ramen. That said, using packaged instant ramen to make this dish has one distinct advantage: Since the noodles cook so quickly, dinner will be on the table in 20 minutes flat.

Recipe: 20-Minute Beef And Broccoli Lo Mein

We love the crispy sesame chicken from our local Chinese restaurant, but as tasty as it is, it can be tough to justify breaking out the deep fat fryer at home. Enter this homemade sesame chicken recipe, which manages to recreate the crispiness of restaurant sesame chicken with a fraction of the oil. The secret is in coating the chicken pieces in cornstarch and shallow frying them until crisp. Finish the chicken in the rich sauce, and then dig in!

Recipe: 20-Minute Sesame Chicken

Egg rolls are crispy little packets of delight, stuffed with meat, vegetables, and loads of aromatics before being deep-fried until golden. This bowl recipe manages to recreate those flavors with fewer calories and carbs by eschewing the traditional wrapper. Instead, you'll be stir-frying pork, cabbage, carrots, and scallions with chili paste, oyster sauce, soy sauce, sesame, ginger, and garlic. The result is super tasty and a healthier choice than traditional egg rolls to boot.

Recipe: 20-Minute Egg Roll In A Bowl

Cantonese for "mushrooms and chicken," moo goo gai pan is a much-beloved Chinese-American stir fry. As its name suggests, this dish stars chicken and baby bella mushrooms, but other veggies play an important supporting role. Crisp water chestnuts, carrots, and snow peas join the key players in the umami-rich seasoning of soy and fish sauces as well as aromatic garlic and ginger. The finished dish is on the table in under half an hour.

Recipe: Moo Goo Gai Pan

Pad see ew may not be as famous as its cousin, pad Thai, but one bite, and you'll fall in love with this delightful Thai noodle dish. Marinated flank steak, broccoli, bok choi, and eggs are stir-fried with rice noodles as a base for this delicious recipe. The rich flavors of black bean paste, hoisin sauce, fish sauce, and garlic bring everything together nicely. Serve sprinkled with sesame seeds, crushed peanuts, and cilantro (for a touch of color and freshness).

Recipe: Pad See Ew

The Szechuan province boasts some of China's most popular dishes, from hot pot to mapo tofu. While much of the region's food packs some heat (especially thanks to its world-famous namesake tongue-numbing pepper), many dishes are mild, like this Szechuan stir-fried chicken with broccoli, cauliflower, and three different kinds of bell pepper. This tasty dish is easy and colorful, and best of all, it reheats well, so it's easy to make a large batch and enjoy the leftovers for lunch for days to come.

Recipe: Szechuan Chicken

Most of the recipes on this list are pretty easy, but the reigning king of simplicity is undoubtedly this teriyaki chicken, which requires just three ingredients and 25 minutes to prepare. Light brown sugar and soy sauce unite to make a rich, savory sauce to coat the lovely pieces of meat, and the chicken breast takes less than 15 minutes to cook. Get ready for your whole family to swoon.

Recipe: 3-Ingredient Teriyaki Chicken

The beef in this recipe is thinly sliced, then seasoned with a sweet-spicy mix of honey, garlic, ginger, and red pepper. While the vegetables used here include bell peppers, broccoli, and carrots, you can swap them out to suit your own preferences, as is the case with almost any stir-fry. Onions or bok choy would work well, while you could also take the opportunity to use up surplus garden produce such as zucchini. You could also opt for rice instead of noodles if you prefer.

Recipe: Classic Beef Stir Fry

Chow mein may have had its heyday back in the mid-20^th century, but even by the end of the last millennium, it was already seen as somewhat out of date. These days, higher-end Chinese restaurants may have replaced chow mein with trendier options like Singapore mei fun, but it can still be a quick and tasty make-at-home meal. One note: The pasta called for here is Chinese-style egg noodles. If you can't find these, you can use linguini, spaghetti, or even ramen, but don't try making chow mein with the kind of extra-wide egg noodles found in casseroles and kugels.

Recipe: Quick Chow Mein

This meat-free stir fry makes a great side dish for an Asian-inspired meal such as teriyaki chicken or sticky ribs, or you could add a meat substitute such as tofu to convert it into a plant-based entree. Well, a mostly plant-based one, that is. In order to make this dish 100% vegan, you'll need to swap out the honey for sugar or just leave it out altogether if you prefer a sauce that's more salty than sweet.

Recipe: Simple Vegetable Stir Fry

What's in 5-spice powder? The seasoning blend is made from cinnamon, cloves, fennel, Sichuan peppercorns, and star anise. Each component may have its own bold flavor, but all these disparate elements blend into one harmonious whole. If there's any kind of meat that's perfectly complemented by this seasoning, it's pork. Here, pork strips are tossed with 5-spice powder, then quickly fried up with a selection of vegetables and a sauce flavored with garlic, ginger, honey, and crushed red pepper. Add noodles or rice and you'll have a delicious dinner in under half an hour.

Recipe: 5-Spice Pork Stir Fry

Udon noodles are nice, fat, and fun to eat. Here, they're quickly cooked and combined with bok choy, mushrooms, and green onions in a Sriracha-spiced sauce. As-is, this dish makes a tasty side, but you can always add some meat, eggs, or tofu to the stir-fry to turn it into a complete meal. If you cook the protein along with the vegetables, you should have plenty of time to finish up before the noodles and sauce are stirred in.

Recipe: Stir-Fried Udon Noodles

While Alex Guarnaschelli isn't really known for her Asian-style recipes, everyone needs a few good stir-fries in their repertoire and her go-to is chicken with peanut sauce. Our take on the celebrity chef's dish, though, is not technically a stir-fry as it's made in an Instant Pot. You can certainly take these same ingredients and fry them up in a pan or wok if you prefer, though, since Guarnaschelli cooks the dish on the stovetop.

Recipe: Alex Guarnaschelli's Chicken Stir Fry With Spicy Peanut Sauce

Vegetable lo mein is a quick and easy side dish that you can whip up using just about any vegetables that you have in the refrigerator. In fact, it's a great way to rescue any produce that needs to be used up right away before it passes the point of no return. If you can find the proper lo mein noodles to use in this dish, all the better. If you can't, though, no worries. Spaghetti or ramen make for serviceable stand-ins.

Recipe: Classic Vegetable Lo Mein

"Mongolian" beef as we know it wasn't created in a yurt on the plains of Dariganga or a buistro in Ulaanbaatar, but rather in a restaurant in Taiwan. Misnomer though it may be, this Mongolian beef recipe is easy to make, packed with flavor, and makes a great entree for vegetable haters since the only greenery involved is a light sprinkling of scallions. You'll definitely want to serve the dish with noodles or rice, though, because you won't want a drop of the spicy-sweet sauce to go to waste.

Recipe: Easy Mongolian Beef

Chop suey is as all-American as hamburgers and hot dogs — that is to say, it may have roots in a different culture, but the dish as we know it is entirely a creation of our immigrant culture. It may have originated in a Chinese-American restaurant or was perhaps created by a Chinese cook in a mining camp, but there's no one standard recipe as it's typically made from whatever meats and vegetables are on hand. This chop suey is made with chicken breasts, bok choy, mushrooms, and bean sprouts, but you won't be bucking tradition if you implement any ingredient swaps of your own.

Recipe: Chicken Chop Suey

Yakisoba is basically a Japanese-style spin on chow mein, and it seems that the dish may actually have originated in China. In Japan, yakisoba uses either buckwheat or ramen noodles, while the meat is typically pork or ham and the vegetables tend to include cabbage, onions, and carrots. For this somewhat more American-style yakisoba, however, we're going with chicken, bell peppers, and broccoli and cooking them up in a soy-based sauce sweetened with ketchup and honey.

Recipe: Chicken Yakisoba

There's no need to cry over uneaten steak. Even though there's no magic steak reheating technique that will revive its former glory, you can instead turn it into another delightful dish: steak fried rice. Cook up some rice, stir it together with a selection of sauteed vegetables, then add in the sliced meat along with a scrambled egg and a tasty stir-fry sauce that combines sweet, salty, and savory flavors.

Recipe: Leftover Steak Fried Rice

Tofu on its own may not have too much taste, but the great thing about it is that it takes on the flavors of whatever it's cooked with. Here, chunks of this pressed soy protein are crisped up with cornstarch before being stir-fried with a medley of vegetables including bell peppers, broccoli, and onions. This dish is seasoned with salt and pepper, as per the title, but also gets a flavor boost from a pinch of 5-spice powder.

Recipe: Salt And Pepper Tofu

Teriyaki chicken may have its roots in Japan, but the dish has long been a favorite of American cooks, as well. This version isn't made with any hard-to-source ingredients; the sauce consists of a simple combination of honey, soy sauce, and rice vinegar. Add some chicken chunks along with oil to fry them in, then toss in a pinch of ginger and garlic for seasoning. If you put on a pot of rice to steam as you start cooking the teriyaki, you'll have a complete meal ready to go in just 20 minutes.

Recipe: Classic Teriyaki Chicken

Pad Thai is one Thai-style dish that just about everyone is familiar with. The mixture of noodles and chicken cooked in salty fish sauce, tangy lime juice, and sugar has a distinctively delicious flavor, while the peanut topping adds a nice crunch. While this particular recipe calls for peanut butter, this ingredient isn't typically used in Thailand so if you wish, you may omit it — and the peanuts, as well — to make this stir-fry safe for those with nut allergies.

Recipe: Spicy Pad Thai

This recipe starts out with a few packets of your standard supermarket-type ramen noodles, and yes, you can feel free to use the cheapest ones you can find since you'll hardly recognize them when they're done. Once the noodles are cooked, they're stir-fried with chicken and vegetables, then flavored with ginger, garlic, chili garlic sauce, and chili oil to make for a mildly spicy one-pot meal. If you want some extra protein, you can also top it off with a fried, poached, or soft-boiled egg.

Recipe: Spicy Noodles

Cookbook author Grace Young has created a number of different variations on the basic stir-fry theme, so she's no stranger to a hot wok. Here she's starting off with chunks of chicken (either breasts or thighs will work), then cooking them up with bok choy, as per the title, along with some bell peppers. The gingery sweet sauce is flavored with hoisin, ketchup, sugar, and sherry, with just a dab of chili garlic sauce adding a little kick.

Recipe: Grace Young's Spicy Ginger Chicken With Peppers And Baby Bok Choy

The starring ingredient in japchae is glass noodles, and if you can find the Korean kind made with sweet potato starch, all the better. Depending on the stores in your area, you may need to use the Thai mung bean or Vietnamese rice kind instead, but those are good, too. Cook your noodles, then mix them into a stir-fried vegetable medley. The one shown here consists of red and green onions, mushrooms, bell peppers, carrots, and spinach, but as with most stir-fries, you can improvise with whatever vegetables you have on hand.

Recipe: Veggie-Filled Japchae

While General Tso's chicken may be named for a Hunanese military hero, the dish itself was first created in Taiwan and perfected in New York. (The chef who developed it was originally from Hunan Province, however.) Some restaurants may glop up the dish with overly-sugary sauces, but making this stir-fried chicken dish at home allows you to customize the sweetness and spice. Dial way back on the sugar, add a pinch more crushed red pepper, maybe stir in a few drops of chili oil — whatever it takes to make the General Tso's chicken that's right for you.

Recipe: Homemade General Tso's Chicken

Rice can be kind of a pain to make, but the next time you cook it, you might want to double the amounts. That way, you'll have the makings for a super-quick next-day fried rice. This dish can involve just about any meats and/or vegetables you have, but in this particular fried rice recipe, we're using ground pork. If you'd prefer non-ground pork, that would work, too –- just slice up a pork chop and cook it until it's no longer pink. Add some seasonings and a few fried eggs and your dinner will be ready to go in no more than 20 minutes.

Recipe: Quick Pork Fried Rice

This stir-fried chicken is one for the vegetable lovers out there — even though chicken is the main ingredient, the recipe calls for a fair amount of broccoli, celery, and bell peppers, as well. As for the sauce, it's as spicy or mild as you want it to be. Even though Hunan cuisine is known for being on the hotter side, the only incendiary ingredient here is chili paste and you can use as much or as little of this as suits your taste.

Recipe: Spicy Hunan Chicken

This super-healthy side dish starts with soba noodles, then fries them up with a big bunch of broccoli, carrots, mushrooms, and bell peppers. The sauce is flavored with peanut butter, although it gets a hint of heat from sriracha. The noodles are also sweetened up with a hefty slug of maple syrup, but get balanced out with soy sauce, lime juice, and a little fresh ginger. All you'll need to do is add some protein of your choice and you'll have a complete meal.

Recipe: 15-Minute Spicy Peanut Soba Noodle Bowl

Eggplant may not be everyone's favorite vegetable, but what it lacks in flavor, it makes up for in versatility. Top it with tomato sauce and cheese and it becomes an Italian entree; dice it, spice it, and stir-fry it and it can be a great Asian-inspired side. Here we're opting for the latter approach, flavoring the eggplant with garlic, ginger, rice vinegar, sesame oil, and soy sauce and stir-frying it up with a serrano pepper or two in order to add a spicy element.

Recipe: Spicy Chinese Eggplant

Yes, we've already had one vegetable lo mein recipe on the list, but this one's extra quick. Here's a hot tip to make it even quicker (since no shopping trip is required): If you have no lo mein noodles in the house, linguini or even spaghetti can work, as can a few packets of ramen. Stir-fry your vegetables while the noodles are boiling, then mix everything together with hoisin, rice vinegar, and soy sauce.

Recipe: 15-Minute Veggie Lo Mein

Don't be put off by the lengthy ingredient list as this recipe really can be cooked up quickly and easily once you've assembled all of the necessary components. Start with pre-peeled shrimp, then fry them up with green onions, a bag of pre-shredded coleslaw mix, and cooked rice noodles. The sauce is a tasty Thai-inspired blend of chile paste, fish sauce, garlic, lime juice, and soy sauce, while the finished dish is topped off with scrambled eggs, chopped peanuts, and bean sprouts.

Recipe: 20-Minute Shrimp Pad Thai

Rice vermicelli might be one of the easiest types of noodles to cook. There's no need to boil up a pan of water and then stir in the pasta. Instead, you can boil the water in a kettle, then pour it over the noodles and then just let them soak for a few minutes. Once they're soft, stir-fry them up with shrimp and vegetables in a sweet and spicy curry-flavored sauce to make this Cantonese street food favorite.

Recipe: Authentic Pan Fried Rice Vermicelli

Rice may not be a typical breakfast dish here in the U.S., but it plays a starring role in Asian morning meals such as Chinese congee or Korean gyeran bap. In this Asian-inspired recipe, scrambled eggs are stir-fried with rice, then spinach, so you can start your day with a dose of healthy greens. The dish is flavored with an Asian-inspired mixture of rice vinegar, sesame oil, and soy sauce, but you can also squirt on some sriracha if you'd like a bit more spice.

Recipe: Quick Breakfast Fried Rice