Fried Rice

Leftover rice, how I love thee! I almost never tire of taking leftover rice and making something tasty with it. And because I know this about myself, when I make rice as part of dinner I tend to make a lot of it, with the intention of having leftovers and making fried rice with it. Fried rice works best with leftover rice; cooling time in the fridge seems to reduce its starchiness and increase its ability to meld with other ingredients.The rice shown above is more or less a classic example of my favorite fried rice, using whatever I had in my fridge. Here is today’s version:

• onions
• fresh ginger
• diced carrots
• diced mushrooms
• 1 fresh manzano chile, de-seeded and diced
• chopped up leftover roast chicken
• 1 egg mixed with pickled fennel juice
• several cups cold cooked rice

Start off by heating a combination of olive oil and butter over medium heat. I’m liking my new nonstick wok purchased pretty much for this purpose. Then add some chopped aromatics — onions, shallots, leeks, scallions, garlic, or any combination of these. I also like to chop up whatever else is in the fridge that needs to be used: sweet peppers, fennel bulb, broccoli, winter greens, snap peas, green beans . . . virtually anything will do, but the key is to chop it finely. Feel free to add meat, too, as I did here. I like to keep everything about the size of a grain of rice or slightly larger. Liberally salt and pepper it all.

Then add the rice. Since it’s cold, you’ll need to sort of spear it with a spatula to break it up. Keep doing that until you have no more rice clumps, until all the ingredients look more or less uniform.

As that cooks, I like to crack two eggs into a coffee cup, add a splash of vinegar (pomegranate vinegar is nice, though today I happened to have fennel pickling juice on hand), whisk them with a fork, add to the rice, and mix well. Taste for salt - citrus salt is always good — and add a handful of chopped herbs (cilantro works especially well). Serve with a mound of pickled ginger, pickled fennel, some sliced avocado, and an icy Belgian beer.