Stir-Fry

A serrated kinpira peeler ($15 online at amazon.com) makes quick work of a carrot-and-celery julienne.

Joseph Gomes, chef at Bombay Talkie in New York City, sprinkles this dish with classic Indian seasonings.

Fried tofu takes on a meaty texture in this traditional Hunan dish that goes from pleasantly spicy to five-alarm fire in a matter of teaspoons. Pungent fermented beans add a satisfying fragrance to the sauce, perfect for spooning over rice.

Work more soy into your diet with this delicious vegetarian dish. Serve with: rice noodles or steamed rice.

China The most challenging part of this recipe is cutting the pork into thin shreds; freeze the meat for 30 or even 60 minutes first, which will make it easier.... (If you want to serve rice with this, which you should, cook it beforehand and keep it warm.) Don't mince the garlic; you want its flavor to be strong in this dish. Serve this with white rice.

One of the most beautiful and inspired cookbooks of the year was The Breath of a Wok. Grace Young's stories and recipes make us want to set off in pursuit of wok hay, the special taste of wok-cooked food. But if the wok itself is too much to tackle, Young gives us permission to stir-fry in a skillet, as her parents did when they emigrated from China to San Francisco.... Young tells us that the Cantonese word for lettuce sounds like the words for "growing fortune," which makes this an auspicious dish to serve for the lunar New Year.

Editor's note:
The recipe and introductory text below are excerpted from Grace Young's book The Breath of a Wok. Young also shared some helpful cooking tips exclusively with Epicurious, which we've added at the bottom of the page. For Young's article on Cantonese cooking, click here. Chef Lee Wan Ching of Yee Hen restaurant on Lantau Island, Hong Kong, taught me this recipe. Traditionally ginger is always cooked with broccoli — its warmth balances the coolness of yin vegetables such as broccoli. Just a small amount of ginger juice intensifies the flavor of the vegetables. To make ginger juice, grate a small amount of ginger and then squeeze it with your fingers to extract the juice.

It's the ultimate shortcut stir-fry.

Sunday dinner. From Golden Door in Escondido, California. Executive chef Michael Stroot loves this stir-fry because it's a showcase for his garden-fresh herbs and produce. And cooking the dish makes the kitchen smell fantastic. Serve it over fiber-rich brown rice.

Toss the takeout! This slimmed-down dish is delish. Traditional Chinese cuisine is among the healthiest, but the American version of sweet-and-sour pork is sugary and fatty. Ying Chang Compestine, author of Secrets From a Healthy Asian Kitchen (Penguin Putnam), gave the recipe a healthy revamp — hers uses the leanest part of the pig and gets its sweetness from fruit. So break out the chopsticks and savor these Far East flavors straight from your stove top.

Enlivened with Southeast Asian flavors, this quick, versatile side dish complements nearly any kind of meal. We've cooked the snap peas until crisp-tender here, but if you'd prefer them to have a meaty quality, cook them a minute longer.

Pa-O Long Beans Finding long beans is worth the effort — the high heat of the wok is just too much for green beans, which aren't as hearty.

George Hendrix of Carbondale, Colorado, writes: "My family is usually in a hurry, so dinner has to be on the table fast. The stir-fry doesn't require much preparation and the oyster sauce gives it rich flavor, which means I don't have any trouble getting my teenage boys to eat the vegetables."

Better than anything you can get at your local takeout joint, this way of making the Chinese classic can be done in record time.

A Chinese meal is incomplete without something leafy, and this dish features a wonderful green. The pleasant bite of gai lan, or Chinese broccoli, complements stir-fried shrimp beautifully; once you've tried it, you'll be eager to cook with it again.