Rainbow Chard, Jewelled Stir Fry, Quick vegan supper

As I stood at the kitchen window, the late afternoon sun slanted through the leaves, creating jewel-like glowing clumps. I had made no plans for my evening meal, so I went out into the back garden to see what I could garner for supper.

I harvested four different colours of chard, plus a standard white-stemmed variety. They don't look as good here in the sink as they did with the sunlight passing through them, but they're still quite stunning.

I decided on a simple stir fry, so took some celery from the fridge, a couple of onions from the basket, and started washing and chopping. Here's what I used, and how I made it:

4 sticks celery, sliced
2 large onions, cut in half, then sliced
8 sticks of chard

3 cloves of garlic, more or less, to taste!
2 chillies, finely chopped (remove the seeds and inner white ribs if you like it less hot!)

sesame oil
olive oil

soy sauce

Cut the ribs from the chard. Chop the ribs in the same way as you would the celery. Roll the leaves of the chard, and slice about a quarter inch or so thick ribbons. Don't they look like a dragon's lair of jewels?

I had red stems, bright cerise, orange and dandelion yellow stems, and the plain white ones, too.

In a large pan pour a glug each of olive and sesame oils. Gently fry the onion and celery until almost cooked through, then add the chilli and garlic.

Toss in the stems of chard, stir for a minute or two, then add the shredded leaves. I'm afraid the steam prevented me from taking a good shot of the leaves wilting down - sorry!

Splosh in some soy sauce, stir everything quickly together for about two minutes, and you're finished.

I served it with jacket potatoes, because my partner was here, and he loves them (so do I, but I would probably have had some rice noodles if I'd been alone).

A drizzle of toasted sesame oil over the top just finished it off nicely. The colours still looked lovely, even when cooked, and it tasted just great. What's more, it didn't take long to cook, and most of it came from the garden and cost very little - yay!!