Fried Rice

This was an old post, but I made fried rice tonight and revised my method. I liked the results well enough to bring this to the front.

Fried rice is serendipity. If you look in the fridge and see leftover rice, you’re most of the way there. The other stuff you need you might already have – and it’s infinitely flexible – if you have no carrots, in goes a bell pepper. If you have no broccoli, in go some leftover green beans. Leftover brown rice is the best, but even basmati will work. Most Chinese restaurants put egg in their fried rice – and as we’ve previously established, I’m Not Much On Eggs, so I don’t. But you could, at the end, put in a well-beaten egg and stir until you got that bits-of-egg-everywhere effect. Easy enough.

This is what I do with leftovers instead of casserole. Because of that, a recipe isn’t really necessary – so I’ll offer a plan, as I sometimes do. (In one recent batch, the leftover tofu from the Tofu and Onions in Caramel Sauce went in.)

Ingredients:
canola and sesame oils for the pan
1 onion, chopped

Heat the oil – about half and half canola and sesame – over medium-high heat in a large skillet or pot. Saute the onion until starting to color. Remove and set aside.

Add:

vegetables chopped as for stir-fry, including these – leftovers are okay:
carrots
celery
bok choy
cabbage
peppers
green beans
asparagus
green onions
etc.

and vegetables that don’t need chopping:
snow peas
frozen peas
mung bean sprouts
etc.

Put the thick or dense vegetables (carrots) in before the quick-cooking vegetables (bean sprouts). Have enough vegetables that they won’t look paltry compared to the volume of rice. Once the vegetables have been stir-fried over high heat for a few minutes, remove them and set aside.

Have ready:
2-3 cloves garlic, minced
1 in. piece fresh ginger, minced
¼ t. red pepper flakes

Add a small amount of oil to the pan, put the garlic, ginger, and red pepper flakes into the oil and sauté until aromatic, just a few seconds.

Then add:
a quantity of rice (I’m usually dealing with about 3-4 c.)
a few dashes of soy sauce

and stir-fry until the rice and seasonings are incorporated. Add back the vegetables – at this point you can add frozen peas if you’d like – and stirl until all parties have all gotten to know each other quite well. If you have some leftover tofu, that can go in too.