Wokked Shiitake and Baby Bok Choy Stir-Fry with Bacon

Finally, something I cook turns out GOOD!

All this experimentation with Indian food has been rather depressing--but I haven't given up yet! I'm going to make Chicken Tikka Masala (my all-time favorite) tomorrow. Back to the dish at hand. I think it turned out well because these are the flavors I've grown up with, and I know how I want the dish to turn out at the end, and I am using cooking techniques well-known to me through watching my parents.

At JA (which I JUST discovered!), I got 6 beautiful shiitake mushrooms for 190 yen. Awesome! Today at Jusco they had the bag of 5 heads of baby bok choy for 138 yen, and the bacon was 500 yen for 6 packs of 2 slices each. Hooray for beautiful fresh vegetables!

Now, then!

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 cloves garlic, finely diced
2-inches ginger, cut into finger-joint sized pieces
1/2 onion, chopped
2 slices bacon, cut into pieces
2 slices canadian bacon, chopped
4 heads Baby Bok Choy,washed and cut into 3" pieces
6 shiitake mushrooms

Sauce:
2 tablespoons Oyster Sauce (Lee Kum Kee brand. It's the most expensive by far, but it is far, far, superior in taste and quality to the other brands)
2 tablespoons Chinese Soy Sauce ("light/less dark soy sauce")
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons sesame oil
(I mix it all together in a cup)

Method:

1. On LOW heat, fry bacon with olive oil. If your pan is too hot, the bacon does not get crispy, it just stays soft! While bacon is frying, chop garlic, onion, and ginger then add them to the pan, in that order. I always wait until the garlic is golden brown before I add the onions. Optional: add a pinch of sugar to the onions to make them extra sweet and carmelized. Wait until garlic and onion are carmelized in color.

2. Add shiitake mushrooms. Meanwhile, wash and cut baby bok choy. Add to pan. stir occassionally for a few minutes so that it doesn't burn. When the bok choy has almost all turned dark green and when the shiitake look slightly limp, pour the sauce over everything. Let cook a few more minutes.

Serve over rice. Or just eat it plain like I did, if you forgot to make rice in your excitement over the quality of your fresh vegetables! The walnut flower-bread you see in the picture was more like dessert. It was dense, sweet, pastry-like, and full of yummy nuts!

Total price: 544 yen + whatever it cost for the sauce ingredients