Healthy Sweet and Sour!

One of the Nation's favourite Asian dishes, sweet and sour can seem intimidating to cook at home. Rather than phoning your local takeaway for a quick fix, stay healthy and balanced with this simple recipe and swap the MSG for fresh veg and a homemade sauce.

Ingredients

Meat or Meat Substitute of your choice – for this recipe we will use two chicken breasts, but pork and Quorn pieces work just as well.

Coconut oil for cooking

Green pepper

2 spring onions

1 tin pineapple chunks

2 cloves of garlic

Ginger – a thumb sized chunk should be enough

1 tbsp Cornflour

½ tbsp sugar

Tomato ketchup 1 tbsp

Dark Soy Sauce 1 tbsp

100ml water

Rice to serve on the side

Method

1. Heat coconut oil on a high heat in a deep pan, a wok is preferable
2. Add your meat/meat substitute of choice and cook for around 10 minutes, stirring regularly to ensure that the oil coats the outside
3. Remove the meat from the pan and place on a serving plate
4. In the same pan add the chopped peppers, spring onions and pineapple chunks along with the finely chopped garlic and ginger. Be sure to save the juice from the pineapple to make the sauce
5. cook these veggies until soft and slightly charred, remove from the heat
6. In a separate bowl add the cornflour, ketchup, soy sauce, pineapple juice and sugar and mix together until they form a syrupy paste.
7. Add 100ml of water to the sauce mixture to loosen and then add to the pan of vegetables.
8. Add the meat/meat substitute and stir through until everything is evenly coated
9. Cook for a further 10 minutes until the whole pan is bubbling gently
10. Serve with rice whilst hot

Show us your own homemade sweet and sour by tagging @elissastef on Instagram or TikTok!

Author: Ellie-Jo Johnstone

@elliejoj