Stir-fry

noun, verb

noun, verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Food cooked in this manner. countable, uncountable
  2. 2
    Any of a class of dishes based on Chinese cuisine, typically comprising strips of meat, vegetable and/or noodles, stir-fried and served coated in a sticky sauce. countable, uncountable

    "16-oz. pkg. vegetable stir-fry mix […] Combine vegetable broth, water, stir-fry mix, soy sauce and sugar in a large saucepot; stir to mix."

Verb
  1. 1
    To fry quickly in hot oil whilst constantly stirring, especially in a wok or similar pan. transitive

    "If you try to knock me, you'll get mocked / I'll stir-fry you in my wok"

Synonyms

All synonyms
bakebarbecuebasteblanchboilbraise

Example

More examples

"Stir-fry the ingredients which were cut into bite-sized pieces."

Etymology

From stir + fry. Coined by American physician Buwei Yang Chao in 1945, in How to Cook and Eat in Chinese.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.