Easy Fried Rice Recipe

Hello All! So one of the biggest problems I hear from people about their physical wellness journey is they don’t know how and what to cook to reach their goals. To solve this, I’m offering a basic recipe that is a staple in my diet that is not only delicious, filling, and nutritious, but also inexpensive and easy to modify to meet specific dietary restrictions. 

In quarantine, I’m staying with my parents. So I don’t have all the basics that I would keep in my pantry. Even so, I can whip up this quick fried rice with some pantry staples. While not the most authentic, it is indeed tasty. 

Also here are a few tips to turn this dish into a nutrition packed meal. While I can eat this as a meal, I would recommend adding more protein to the dish by adding your favorite protein of choice to the fried rice. If you add cooked steak, it makes beef fried rice. If you add tofu scramble or pan seared vegetarian protein, it makes a great vegan/vegetarian option. You can make it keto by adding more protein, omitting the corn, and using cauliflower rice as an alternative. It can be gluten free by adding tamari instead of soy sauce. To make it oil free steam the dish by dropping a few drops of water. My favorite way to modify is by going the keto route and adding some chopped vegetarian protein, like Quorn. This modification lowers the caloric intake of the dish, but keeps me full until my next serving. 

For the tools you’ll need, I used a wok, but you can use a regular skillet, just make sure that you don’t overcrowd your pan. You want to have enough space to be able to create a crater for all of your additional ingredients, as you’ll see in the photos. You’ll also need a small bowl and fork for your eggs and a spoon to mix everything together.

For cooking it up, I recommend cutting all of your ingredients into similar sized pieces before you turn on the stove. You can also augment this by adding almost any leafy green vegetable, mushroom, broccoli, etc. you want to get rid of. The beauty of the recipe is you can add more or less veggie depending on what you have and need.

Here you can see I have both white rice and cauliflower rice. I like to use cold rice and frozen cauliflower rice for the best results. If you are using warm rice, it will be a bit mushy, but good nonetheless. Also you can use any kind of rice you like for example brown rice, short grain, long grain, and cauliflower rice have all worked well for me. If you are looking to add a protein source cook your protein first and set aside. Use the residual rendered fats, seasonings, and flavors to season your fried rice in the pan.

Next, since I used fresh carrots, I need to brown off my carrots to start the caramelization process. If you use a mixed veggie mix, you don’t have to do this.

After slightly brown, I remove the carrots and heat the pan to a medium-high heat. Once slightly smokey, I add 1 tbsp of oil and add the rice. I pan fry the rice until heated through. Then I create a crater and add my onion to the pan.

Once my onion is translucent I stir it in with the rice and create another crater moving the rice to the edges of the pan. I then add all of my firmer vegetables. If you’re adding leafy greens like cabbage or kale, don’t add these at this point.

Stir in vegetables. Then add the soy sauce. In a separate bowl, crack, season, and scramble the egg.  After heating through and the vegetables become bright, create another crater and add the egg in.

I then let my egg sit until golden brown on the bottom, this creates larger egg chunks in the rice. If you’d like the egg evenly distributed, mix thoroughly while the egg is runny. At this point I season with crushed red pepper, garlic, and onion. Once golden brown, I mix the egg into the rice and let the rice brown until my desired “hardness”. This will depend on how fried you like your rice and your vegetables. At this point, if you have leafy green vegetables, add them here so they can wilt quickly, but still have some texture. Lastly, salt and pepper to taste. You can also garnish with sriracha, parsley, and additional soy sauce.