Fried Rice Fun

Very few of the home cooking posts here have been recipes that I've come up with from scratch. Probably just the maroulosalata and the semi-homemade kimchi mac and cheese. Most of the other posts are adaptations of recipes from cookbooks, blogs or other online sites. I love reading recipes for ideas and inspiration, and since I'm still what I would call a novice cook, I also cook with them to learn new combinations, techniques and dishes. One of my goals is to be able to cook more without needing to resort to a recipe, and the fried rice I made this week was a good chance to try to employ that philosophy.

Ingredients:

We had odds and ends of various things in the fridge so fried rice just seemed like the obvious answer. I suppose this could qualify as a one pot meal for the challenge if I had used leftover rice from another meal, but unfortunately we didn't have any and I needed to use the rice cooker. The ingredients were:

- 1 egg, beaten ($0.17)
- 2 cloves of garlic, minced ($0.10)
- 4 oz of turkey bacon, cut into very small pieces ($0.93)
- 1/2 package of snow vegetables (preserved xue cai), roughly chopped ($0.30)
- 3 stalks of celery, chopped ($0.30)
- 1/4 cup of cilantro, roughly chopped ($0.40)
- Cooked brown rice, equivalent of 2 cups uncooked * ($1.25)
- 2 tsp light soy sauce ($0.10)
- Canola oil for cooking ($0.05)

* If you don't have day old leftover rice and are making rice in the rice cooker on the same day like I did, try to use a little less water than you normally would so it comes out a little drier.

The fried rice cost about $3.50, and since we ate this with another dish in place of rice, there was still a little leftover for lunch. Not bad at all. The price of course is dependent on what's in the fridge as I don't think I would specifically go out to buy something to add into fried rice, but I can't imagine it would go above $5.

Process:

1. Heat canola oil in wok over high heat, and add garlic. After about a minute, add celery and turkey bacon. 

2. Once celery has softened and bacon is cooked through, push both ingredients to the side and add the beaten egg to the bottom of the wok. Allow the egg to set, then begin to scramble it and break it apart into smaller pieces. (You could scramble an egg in another pan, or make an omelette and then cut it into pieces, but I didn't want to waste another pan. We had enough dishes that night as it was.)

3. Add snow vegetables and continue to stir fry for another minute or so.

4. Add the rice to the wok and mix everything together.

5. Add the light soy sauce (to taste). Stir in cilantro leaves and remove from heat.

Review:

I don't think I've ever actually made fried rice before, although I'm very familiar with it in concept and have eaten it many times. It's a really easy thing to make and you can throw anything into it. I think it's one of the best ways to avoid food waste.

This fried rice came out well. The snow vegetables added a nice sour flavor, while the turkey bacon contributed saltiness. A didn't think the fried rice needed the extra soy sauce because it had enough salt from the bacon and snow vegetables, but I don't mind my fried rice with a little splash of soy sauce. Either way works for me. A's not a big fan of the turkey bacon because of its unnatural shape and color (you can see the slices whole here). It's not part of my usual purchases and was just leftover from the Polish recipe, so I doubt we'd use this for the meat component again.

Improvements for next time? Maybe 2 eggs instead. Less (or no) soy sauce. Different ingredients to try something new. Maybe some spice. Kimchi fried rice sounds good to me...