Fried Rice is Twice as Nice as Regular Rice.

I don't know about you but I always have leftover rice in my fridge. I love rice. Sometimes I'll just make a simple gravy or sauce and throw it over a microwaved bowl of leftover rice and top it with a fried egg. I hate brown rice though. Never liked it. No, I'm not a racist. I just hate the flavor and texture and existence of brown rice. You gots to mill that coat off. It's like eating a banana with the peel on. Ick. My favorite rices are jasmine, basmati, sticky, calrose, and good ole plain whitey white long grain rice. Although never buy that pre-boiled crap that smiley Uncle Ben tries to pass off as rice. Mushy maggots. That's what I think of when I eat minute rice.

Wanna make perfect rice? Of course you do. Here's how you do. In a pot cover the rice with running cold water and scrub with clean hands until the water gets cloudy. Drain in a colander. Repeat 3-4 times until the water is not longer cloudy. In a heavy bottomed pot with a tight fitting lid cover the rice by 1/2" with cold water. Place on stove over high heat. Add salt if you like. Bring to a boil. Cover and turn heat to very low. Leave it alone for 17 minutes. Remove from heat and fluff with a fork. That's it. You are now one with the rice gods.

So I had some leftover calrose rice the other day and decided to make South-East Asian style fried rice. I sauteed up some celery, scallions, garlic, and ginger in peanut oil. Then I added some sliced lap cheong (spicy sweet Chinese sausage) and cooked until the fat was rendered out. Tossed in the rice. Added soy sauce, chili garlic sambal, fish sauce, lime, sesame oil, and black palm vinegar. Cooked for a few more minutes and dumped it in a bowl. Topped it off with sliced avocado, pickled egg, scallions, and cilantro. It was freaking delicious and pretty easy. So the next time you have leftover rice, don't just let it sit there and make your fridge seem sad. My mother used to say "There are people starving in China." when we were kids and didn't clean our plates (although I pretty much always cleaned my plate and the plates of those around me). To which I would reply "Even though they have all that rice?". I didn't know any better. Anyways, there are people starving everywhere so use up your leftovers. Be creative. Don't be a lazy wasteful jerk. You can make delicious things out of almost everything that's slowly rotting in your fridge! Yum! xoxox