Wild Alaska pollock Quick Cuts are perfect to use in stir-fries: They are already cubed up into bite-sized pieces, ready to marinate, steam, fry, and enjoy.
Many of the following recipes don’t call for pollock, specifically, but it is a suitable substitute. As a mild, firm, white-fleshed fish, wild Alaska pollock is the perfect blank canvas for flavors that come together in a smoking hot wok.
A few notes before you get your pollock stir-fry into motion: when making stir-fries at home, you do ideally want a wok to cook with, as the pans are designed to evenly distribute the heat from a hot flame and give you plenty of space to cook in. If you have an electric range, just use a large pan and make do with what you have. Either way, keep in mind that you’re working with high temperatures — so choose a proper frying oil that has a high smoke point.
When you’re ready to get to work with your wok, here are 7 stir-fry recipes to make with wild Alaska pollock quick cuts.
Kung Pao Fish
If you’re a fan of Szechuan foods, this dish of Kung Pao fish from Serious Eats will have you breaking the best kind of sweat. You’ll need to have some specific ingredients in your pantry to make it properly — including Szechuan peppercorns for that tingly effect, a chili bean sauce called doubanjiang to make your Kung Pao pollock spicy and savory, and dried Chinese red peppers for extra heat. You might hesitate to invest in ingredients that are so unique to Szechuan cooking, but trust us: You’ll be making this dish as often as you can stand the spice.
Stir-Fried Fish with Black Beans Sauce and Mushrooms
Dreams of Dashi’s recipe for stir-fried fish with fermented black beans and wood ear mushrooms is a simple, umami-rich way to enjoy pollock quick cuts with your choice of a few seasonal veggies. Switch out the bok choy for any type of tender Asian mustard green, fresh beans, snow peas… anything that will soften up after just a minute or so in a wok. While the recipe itself calls for fermented black beans, for a shortcut, you can simply buy a good jar of Chinese fermented black bean paste to mix, to taste, into the chicken broth to create a sauce for the final step.
Indian-Spiced Fish Stir-Fry with Okra
This recipe from The Christian Science Monitor for stir-fried fish with okra has a South Asian twist. Spiced with garam masala and fresh chilis, and served with rice steamed in coconut milk, the overall dish is rich in complexity but mild in heat. If you don’t have access to okra, you can sub them out for blanched broccoli florets for an equally delicious combo of flavors and textures.
Sweet and Sour Stir-Fry with Steamed Fish
In this recipe from Ching He Huang for sweet and sour fish, you’re not stir-frying the fish itself; you’ll just be stir-frying the savory, sweet, and sour components to serve as a sauce to pour over the final dish. Made with pineapples, ginger, peppers, and a big splash of rice vinegar, it’s full of refreshing, light flavors. As for the fish, you will just need to have a bamboo steamer to cook them up.
Sweet, Sour, and Spicy Stir-Fry
Another sweet and sour fish stir-fry, Hank Shaw’s recipe has a slightly different take, using a mix of fish stock, Chinese black vinegar (or malt vinegar, if that’s what you have on hand), tomato paste, and sugar to create a sauce to pour over battered and stir-fried fish. Chinese dried red peppers would be a great addition to this stir-fry, but you can use whatever dried red chili you like.
Creamy Thai Stir-Fry
This Thai-inspired stir-fry from Sian Family Recipes is rich with creamy, spicy, and sweet flavors, with a sauce composed of coconut milk, Thai red chili paste, and something called “tamarina sauce.” If you have that, great — but you can easily make something at home that will be even tastier than bottled tamarina with this recipe from Serious Eats for a sweet tamarind chutney.
