Dark Fried Rice
Why I Love This Recipe
In the USA, East Coast fried rice and West Coast fried rice differ greatly. In the East, it's dark, flavorful rice with a few carrots, peas and other veggies tossed in. In the West, fried rice is light and often has more veggies. This recipe is based on the East Coast mentality that fried rice should be rich, dark and be loaded with flavor.
Ingredients You'll Need
1 cup dry rice, prepared (should make a couple cups)
Soy sauce
Teriyaki sauce (I use Tabasco Spicy)
Salt
Pepper
1/2 cup diced yellow onion
1/2 cup sliced carrot
2 stalks celery, sliced
6 green onions, sliced
Oil (extra-light olive or vegetable or peanut)
Honey
Brown sugar
1 1/2 cups raw beef tips
Directions
Take your beef tips (or chicken, tofu, pork, etc) and place them in a marinade-worthy dish.
Add a few shakes of soy sauce, a few shakes of teriyaki sauce, about 2 tbsp. honey, about 1 tbsp. brown sugar, 1/2 tbsp. oil, and half the green onions.
Set aside to let the flavors develop.
Note: You could easily get by with just marinating in a bit of oil and soy + teriyaki sauces.
Heat up a small amount of oil in a large skillet on high heat.
Once it's hot, add the rice and stir it around.
Allow the rice to sit and cook for a few minutes, stirring just a few times.
Push the rice to the outskirts of the pan, leaving a crater hole in the center.
Add the meat in the center, making sure to not add ANY excess liquid.
You want the seared flavor, if excess liquid gets in, it'll boil the meat. Ew.
Let the meat sear for 2-3 minutes, then give it a good stir.
Repeat this until it looks pretty well cooked.
Now, toss on the load of veggies (everything else) and stir it up.
Stirring just a few times, give the veggies a time to cook and get better acquainted with the other ingredients.
Add salt and pepper - I used a shaker of kosher salt, shaking liberally all around the pan, and the same with black pepper.
With fried rice, my new rule of thumb is add as much as you think is necessary, then a bit more.
Now for the essential step. Give everything a good stir and spread it evenly around the pan.
Take your soy sauce and shake it about 8 to 12 times over the mixture, soon you'll hear a searing sizzle sound.
Let it sear for at least 45 seconds, up to a couple minutes (depending on how hot your range gets).
This really "fries" in the flavor.
After it has been untouched for 45+ seconds, give it a stir then repeat the same process with teriyaki sauce.
Let it sit, really cook into the rice, veggies and meat, sear sear sear.
After you've waited an uncomfortable amount of time, stir it up again and you should see some tasty looking fried rice.