Stir-fried Watercress: Chinese-Style - The Woks of Life (2024)

Watercress (西洋菜,sai yeung choi in Cantonese or xī yáng cài in Mandarin), is a super healthy vegetable. It’s often overlooked at the market, because people don’t know how to prepare it. But making this stir-fried watercress at home is an easy, delicious, and healthy way to change up the vegetables on your dinner table.

A Healthy Vegetable That Deserves a Spot on the Table

Watercress is rich in vitamin C, calcium, iron phosphate and vitamin E. It’s one of our favorite healthy leafy green vegetables, and we enjoy it most often stir-fried simply with fresh ginger and garlic.

Watercress is generally sold in small bunches, usually in a container of shallow water. Watercress grows well alongside running water. We used to pick it in the wild when I was growing up in upstate New York! If you’re not stumbling upon it in the wild though, it usually runs anywhere from $1-2 per bunch. If you have a stream or a pond on your property, check our post on How to Grow Watercress. It’s really easy to grow and you can enjoy it like we do every year!

More Than a Salad Green!

The only problem with watercress is that most people don’t know what to do with it other than throw it in a salad.

We’ve made Watercress Pork Bone Soup, which is a delicious way to enjoy this spicy, peppery, and slightly bitter green vegetable during the colder months.

But now that it’s spring and summer is around the corner, this stir-fried watercress is a great side and simple dish to add to your list of go-to vegetable recipes.

Stir-fried Watercress: Recipe Instructions

Place your wok over medium high heat, and add the oil, spreading it around to coat the surface of the wok.

Add the fresh ginger, letting it caramelize and infuse the oil. Take care not to let it burn. Add the minced garlic, and give it a stir. Immediately add the watercress (if you wait too long, your garlic could burn). Turn the heat up to high.

Stir-fry the watercress for 20 seconds to evenly distribute the ginger, garlic and oil. Once mixed, move all of the watercress to the center of the wok in a small pile, and cover the wok.

After 45 seconds, uncover the wok. There should be plenty of steam at this point. Use a circular stirring motion to drag the pile of watercress and some of the liquid around the sides of the superheated wok.

Stirring the watercress against the hottest and driest part of the wok will generate that wok hay flavor. Gather the watercress back in the middle of the wok. To give you an idea of the cooking time, this step should take no more than 20 seconds.

While you wait for the sides of the wok to reheat, add the white pepper, sugar, salt, sesame oil and MSG. (MSG is a totally optional—and often controversial—ingredient. Read more about our perspective on MSG.)

. (A quick note on the spices: we list MSG as optional because many people shy away from it, but it’s a tasty addition to leafy green vegetables that really gives you that restaurant flavor. Use it per your own tastes and perspectives!)

Stir-fry the mixture again to mix in the seasonings, once more stirring the watercress and the liquid so it hits the sides of the wok to generate more wok hay.

Use your wok spatula to scoop the stir-fried watercress onto a shallow rimmed bowl, making sure to get the remaining liquid, as it’s super-infused with garlic, ginger, and those vitamins from the watercress.

Serve as a side dish or just with some white rice as a super light vegan meal.