Easy Stir Fry Sauce

Whip up an easy Stir Fry Sauce with only three ingredients! It's the perfect addition to quick stir fry dinners and meal prep lunches.

Easy Stir Fry Sauce Recipe

When it's time to put together a quick meal, I often turn to stir fry dinners.

Stir fry is always a great idea because I can use whatever leftover meat we have (it works for chicken, shrimp or steak) and some frozen or fresh veggies and have dinner on the table in no time. It's always great as leftovers too.

Though you can buy pre-made stir fry sauces at the supermarket, I prefer making a quick homemade sauce because it’s just so simple to do!

With only three ingredients, you can level up your stir fry dinners with this easy sauce recipe.

Why You'll Love This Recipe

Stir fries are so much better with a great stir fry sauce!

• My stir fry sauce only has THREE ingredients. And you might already have them in your pantry.
• You know exactly what's in it — there are no hidden ingredients!
• There's no need to dirty a lot of dishes for this sauce. Just pour everything into a mason jar and shake it up!
• This homemade stir fry sauce recipe is so delicious and versatile. Try it with your favorite proteins, veggies and starches.

What is Stir Fry?

Stir frying is a technique for pan-frying meat and vegetables with a little bit of oil or sauce, similar to sautéeing. It is often served with noodles or rice, but can also be eaten on its own.

It’s a common cooking method that originated in China, but is now beloved around the world.

Stir fries are an easy meal that comes together quickly. They are versatile — make them for weeknight dinners, date nights or even weekday lunch meal prep.

Ingredients

This three-ingredient stir fry sauce recipe is so easy. Here’s what you’ll need to grab at the grocery store to make your own stir fry sauce (if you don't already have everything in your pantry, that is!):

• sesame oil
• coconut aminos
• corn starch

One thing I especially love about making condiments at home is that you can control what goes in them. A lot of store-bought sauces are made with preservatives and sweeteners. This recipe is a lot simpler and healthier.

This delicious stir fry sauce recipe is a great base recipe. If you want to add more flavors, you can experiment with adding minced garlic or fresh ginger into the mix. If you'd like it sweeter, play with adding a little bit of brown sugar, honey or maple syrup and add more to taste.

Substitutions

Don't have the above ingredients? No problem. Here's what you can use instead:

Coconut aminos: You can use soy sauce or tamari instead. Both regular soy sauce and low sodium soy sauce will work.

Sesame oil: You can use grapeseed oil, peanut oil, avocado oil or olive oil as a substitute. Sesame seed oil is preferred for its distinct, nutty flavor that adds so much to any stir fry dish!

Cornstarch: This is what thickens the sauce and makes it less runny. For a corn starch substitute, arrowroot powder or potato starch will perform best.

For a gluten-free stir fry sauce, you should use coconut aminos or gluten-free tamari.

How to Make Stir Fry Sauce

This is a super simple recipe. It comes together in less time than it would take to find stir fry sauce at the grocery store!

First, add all the ingredients to a mason jar or small bowl. I prefer the mason jar method because I can just stash it in the fridge when I'm done and I don't need to dirty more dishes!

If using a mason jar, put the lid on and shake, shake, shake! You want everything to be well combined.

If doing the bowl-method, whisk the ingredients together until combined.

How to Store Stir Fry Sauce

The Stir Fry Sauce can keep on its own in an airtight container in your fridge for about a month. This is great if you make stir fry often — you may want to double the recipe!

You may need to shake up the jar to redistribute the ingredients each time.

Keep in mind that once you mix the sauce with meat or vegetables, the shelf life will only be as long as those ingredients are safe to eat.

How to Make a Quick Stir Fry

Once you have a stir fry sauce, you can get to work on putting together a quick stir fry.

First, you'll need a protein. You can use any basic leftovers (hello, leftover chicken), shred a rotisserie chicken or cook up something new, like ground beef, pork, turkey or chicken.

You can also make stir fries vegetarian — you can skip the protein or use a substitute like plant-based meat crumbles or tofu.

If starting with raw meat, brown it in a skillet or stir fry pan and set it aside. If starting with leftovers, add them to the pan once you've cooked the veggies to warm it up.

Then you'll need some stir fry vegetables. Fresh, frozen or leftover veggies will all work. (Zucchini, carrots and green onion are one of my favorite combos.)

Hot Tip: You can pick up a bag of mixed stir fry veggies in the frozen section of your grocery store to keep on hand whenever you get the craving for stir fry. The pre-mixed packages usually contain a variety of veggies, such as green beans, snow peas, mini corn cobs, carrots, broccoli, onion, bell peppers, mushrooms and/or water chestnuts.

Sauté the veggies in the skillet over medium heat with a light amount of cooking oil. Add the meat. Season with salt and pepper. Then add in some stir fry sauce and mix until distributed.

Then serve over your favorite starchy side or on a salad. Top with sesame seeds, red pepper flakes and green onions if you're feeling fancy. Feel free to add more sauce if you like!

What To Serve With Stir Fry

Stir fry recipes are delicious on their own, but it’s also wonderful served with a grain, spooned over a salad or stirred into some noodles. (My family loves brown rice, so that’s what we usually serve with it.)

Here are a few ideas:

• soba noodles
• udon noodles
• white rice
• brown rice
• cauliflower rice
• mixed greens

You could also put it right into butter lettuce leaves to make lettuce wraps for a low carb option. Those are another great idea for busy weeknights. (And a great way to use up leftovers from this ground turkey stir fry recipe!)

Favorite Stir Fry Recipes

Try this stir fry sauce with any of these easy recipes:

• Easy Ground Turkey Stir Fry
• Healthy Shrimp Stir Fry
• Thai Stir Fry with Pork