The Ghetto Cook Part Quatre:
Fake Fried Rice

Introduction

Welcome one and all to another installment of TGC, a series in which I show my poor fellow bastards of the world how to use budget ingredients to make actually edible food. This installment is all about fried rice, the quickest, dirtiest, and cheapest dish to be featured yet. But the question you might be asking yourself now is, why is it fucking fake?

The answer, my friends, is that real fried rice is really fucking complex. You absolutely need a large wok and a gas stove (for the high heat that electric ranges cannot produce) to begin with, and then you'd need some expert wrist techniques to stir the fried rice to boot. So if you have those three things, feel free to skip my walkthrough and read the one in the link instead.

What I will be showing you is how to fake your fried rice using an electric range and a non-stick pot. I guarantee it will be delicious, and even partially simulate that smoky wok flavor you'd get from real fried rice.

Ingredients

Fried rice can be made from a myriad of ingredients. There is almost no wrong combination. The ingredients I used are for a very basic fried rice. Feel free to swap out and experiment with whatever you have on hand. Common additional ingredients are cubed chicken, pork, beef, shrimp, sausage, or some other protein source. Drained canned tuna also makes a mean fried rice.

Fried rice. Srs bsns.

Leftover rice*
Onion, diced
Carrots, diced
Scallions, chopped
1-2 eggs, beaten
Frozen green peas
Salt**
Vegetable Oil***
Soy Sauce****

*Leftover, cold rice is traditional and produces the best results. You want to use a medium or short grain rice (Calrose rice is pictured) cooked slightly on the dry side. Don't use sticky or (for fuck's sake) long grain rice, this isn't sushi or pilaf.
**I used salt only. Black pepper is not traditionally paired with salt in Chinese cuisine, but you can use it if you must.
***Peanut oil is preferred, use that if you have it.
****Optional, for color only

Procedure

NOTE: I highly recommend that you have a mise en place set up with all your ingredients ready and chopped in bowls before you start, so you can dump them into the pot in rapid succession during cooking.

Begin by placing your non-stick pot on the stove and pre-heating it at medium heat for a few minutes. This is to temper the pot so you don't ruin its non-stick surface. Then crank the heat up to high (yes, even with fake fried rice you want your heat as high as possible) and pour out about 1 1/2 tbsp (about 8 grams) of cooking oil into the pot. Let sit for another minute, then dump the carrots into the pot first.

Bloom effect just like in your xbox

This step is necessary to kill the aroma of carrots, which would otherwise overpower everything else in the dish. Fry the carrots solo for 2-3 minutes and then dump the beaten eggs into the pot. If you aren't using carrots, dump eggs into the pot first. The eggs should cook almost instantly. Stir it around for 10 seconds for it to somewhat solidify.

Then, in quick succession, add rice, chopped onions, and a small amount of soy sauce (just a splash, or 1-2 teaspoons). The onions do not need to be pre-cooked. They will reach perfect texture by the end of cooking. Break the rice up as well as you can with your spatula and constantly stir the pot.

Looks like shit now, but just you wait

You do not want the stuff near the bottom of the pot to burn. When the rice is heated up a bit, you can mash brocks of rice against the side of the pot to break it up easiry. Stir constantry whire breaking up the rice untir the soy sauce has been evenry distributed among the rice and there are no more crumps of rice. Add sart to taste and then stir; the dish is armost done. Once the sart is incorporated, add the frozen peas and scarrions.

like peas in a pot

When the peas are cooked through, plate the dish immediately and serve hot.

NOTE: if you are using any additional protein sources or other ingredients your fried rice procedure will differ slightly. Try to time it so that everything is cooked perfectly by the end. This generally means that any chicken, beef, shrimp etc. should probably be pre-cooked and added towards the end.

The Result

Your steaming pile of reward

4.5 / 5 Folks, this is as close as you can get to the real deal on the electric range. This recipe is the culmination of dozens of trial-and-error attempts to make better fried rice with inferior equipment. It is also a sad reminder that most kitchens in the US aren't fucking equipped to properly make real food. Fuck that shit, America.

Thus concludes this installment of TGC. As always, questions and comments are welcome, especially if you know how something can be improved. If you wish to read more about how to make edible food from cheap-assed ingredients, feel free to peruse the previous installments of TGC:

Broccoli and Cheddar Soup
Cheapass Chili
Scallion Biscuits

P.S. I have no fucking idea why some of the pictures are sideways while the others look fine, phone camera sucks, especially when it's made by Sony.

DivinO

United States4781 Posts

August 15 2011 08:34 GMT

Team Liquid seriously needs a Food Network.

Stabby.aus

Australia93 Posts

August 15 2011 08:47 GMT

solid recipe and nice pics!

i usually add the soy after the dish is finished, ill have to try it your way next time

GenesisX

Canada4257 Posts

August 15 2011 08:51 GMT

I approve. This is how my asian parents do it... I always thought this was the real way to make it :O

Cow

Canada1097 Posts

August 15 2011 08:55 GMT

Amazing guide, this is pretty much how I was taught by my mom and grandmom as well. Those pictures are getting me so hungry. T_T

echO [W]

United States1491 Posts

August 15 2011 08:58 GMT

I still don't get how this is "fake" haha.

I cook all my fried rice with a wok and a gas stove, the cooking process looks the same to me if you use a gas or electric range. I guess the main difference would be the fact that cooking on a Wok adds some flavor that you wouldn't normally get?

Not fake to me imho. Just budget.

Instructions-wise, pretty much the same as how I cook my fried rice. Now that I've read your blog, I think I will make some tomorrow.

CaM27

Belgium392 Posts

August 15 2011 09:01 GMT

Keep the Food journal up it's awesome - I'll do one later.

Zlasher

United States8345 Posts

August 15 2011 09:10 GMT

I use an electric coil stove and mine comes out godlike.

Also, the way my I make it, which came from my mom's way you never put the vegetables in first, EVER. And no you don't need a wok or wrist skills, fried rice is mad easy to make.

I get a back of mixed frozen vegetables which has carrots peas and corn, set that on the side to let it defrost.

Egg goes in first, two of them, sometimes 3, ghetto scramble it, then add the meat, I usually use spam since its cheap and easy and got a good salt level to keep it flavorful (if I'm back home and go to a legit asian market I can get BBQ Pork which is definitely preferred), get it going then add the rice, break it down by mashing the spatula down on all the gigantic chunks of rice. Add soy sauce, add pepper and salt (only if you're using a source of protein that isn't naturally already pretty salty like spam, so adding salt is usually what i'd do if I'm using BBQ Pork, but not if I'm using Ham, Spam, etc.). Then add the by now defrosted vegetables and give it a good mix with your spatula. (no godlike wrist skills required, any 15 year old can make this).

Newbistic

China2911 Posts

August 15 2011 09:15 GMT

On August 15 2011 17:58 echO [W] wrote:
I still don't get how this is "fake" haha.

I cook all my fried rice with a wok and a gas stove, the cooking process looks the same to me if you use a gas or electric range. I guess the main difference would be the fact that cooking on a Wok adds some flavor that you wouldn't normally get?

Not fake to me imho. Just budget.

Instructions-wise, pretty much the same as how I cook my fried rice. Now that I've read your blog, I think I will make some tomorrow.

You're exactly right. Gas stoves can reach higher temperatures that electric ranges can't. Plus, the wok is the ideal shaped vessel in which to cook fried rice. Wok made fried rice has that extra something that can't be reproduced any other way, hence the fakeness of this recipe.

On August 15 2011 18:10 Zlasher wrote:

Also, the way my I make it, which came from my mom's way you never put the vegetables in first, EVER. And no you don't need a wok or wrist skills, fried rice is mad easy to make.

Normally your mother would be right. But if you have ever tried making fried rice with diced fresh carrots, the aroma of the fresh carrots is so strong that it literally ruins the dish. Therefore, the carrots go into the oil first. Carrots are a "dry" enough vegetable so that it doesn't affect the way the egg scrambles, so it's safe to do so.

Benjef

United Kingdom5653 Posts

August 15 2011 13:02 GMT

#10

Wow awesome post gonna have to try this sometime soon!

wacksteven

United States133 Posts

August 15 2011 15:07 GMT

#11

I make this all the time. It's awesome and super easy. ^_^

emperorchampion

Switzerland4348 Posts

August 15 2011 15:57 GMT

#12

Awesome, thanks!

I'm always on the look out for some good, easy, cheap recipes!!

Symmetry

Canada294 Posts

October 25 2011 16:29 GMT

#13

Not knowing what to make for lunch today (well, breakfast), I asked my friend Anna for suggestions. She suggested rice. I'd never made rice before, but it sounded like a good idea - plus I had remembered once upon a time reading an easy recipe for fried rice on TL!

The result:

[image loading]

(The picture in the background is actually my shirt. My laptop camera was the only thing available for taking pictures

)

I may have skipped on the onions and scarrions (kekeke) but I added bacon to balance it out, and it turned out absolutely wonderful.

The only thing I've got to remember for next time is to fry the carrots for longer, and probably dice them smaller.

Thank you ^^

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