Week 2 - Rice

We eat a lot of rice of all types at home, so for the rice challenge, I just looked for something different that I had never made before. Although fried rice was nothing new, I had never made one like Martha Stewart's shiitake fried rice, so I figured I would try it her way and see how it went, maybe picking up some tips that I could use in the future.

The ingredients used (slightly modified from the original) were:

- 1.5 cups brown rice, cooked and set in fridge to cool ($1.50)

- a few handfuls of dried shiitake mushrooms, rehydrated, stems removed, and sliced ($1.50)

- about a cup of frozen shelled edamame, thawed ($0.90)

- oil for cooking ($0.20)

- 2 eggs, beaten ($0.15)

- salt and pepper ($0.05)

- a couple of spoonfuls of minced garlic ($0.25)

- about a tbsp of ginger paste ($0.25)

- a few shakes of red pepper flakes ($0.05)

- 1/2 batch of scallions, sliced on diagonal ($0.70)

- a few tbsp soy sauce ($0.30)

- lime juice to taste ($0.10)

The total for the fried rice was about $5.95 (completely estimated since I have no memory of what the shiitake mushrooms cost). We ate it with a couple of pollock burgers, but that didn't add more than a couple of dollars. Very affordable dinner.

The steps for making the fried rice (as adapted) were:

1. About half an hour before cooking, set rice to cook in rice cooker, put shiitake mushrooms in bowl of warm water to rehydrate, take out edamame to thaw. When rice is done, stir with spoon and then put bowl into the fridge to cool.

2. Prep: slice shiitake mushrooms, slice scallions (also garlic and ginger if not using shortcut products).

3. Add oil to small skillet and then cook beaten egg in single thin layer until cooked through. Remove to cutting board to cool. Once cool, chop egg into small strips.

4. Add some oil to wok and then add mushrooms with garlic, ginger, and red pepper flakes. Cook for a few minutes.

5. Add edamame and cook for a couple of minutes.

6. Add rice, eggs, scallions, soy sauce, and lime juice. Mix well and cook for a few minutes until everything is done. Adjust seasonings to taste if needed.

This fried rice was simple, but I think the simplicity was a good thing. It turned out a lot more balanced than some other fried rice dishes I've made, where I'm trying to clear out the fridge or just throwing whatever I can find into the fried rice. This would also be really easy to make any time that we had scallions, since pretty much everything else is in the pantry. I would definitely make this again.