Fried Rice

I should tell you that I made this recipe up as I went along.  But since the results were delicious, I'm happy to share my concoction with the rest of you.  The Mrs wanted to have frozen Chinese appetizers for dinner -- it was "National Frozen Food Day" after all.  So we like to put potstickers and egg rolls in the toaster oven and have them with some type of rice or noodle dish.  I opted for rice.

For those of you who have read my previous posts, you'll know by now that I use whole grain brown rice.  I heated up a larger non-stick skillet over medium-high heat, and added a little oil.  Then I tossed in the rice and toasted them for a little bit.  Next, I added fresh minced ginger, minced garlic, and strips of onion.

Once the onions had sweat a little, I started to add water in about 1/2 to 1 cup increments ... almost like preparing risotto   Basically I was just trying to get enough moister in there to cook the rice.  But I didn't want to have it really runny either.  I also added mustard powder, teriyaki sauce, soy sauce, and lime juice.

I let that cook for a little while and then added thin strips of carrots.  And here is the interesting part that I was hoping would work.  I have seen this done when watching an Asian chef cooking with a wok:  I added two eggs.  As soon as they hit the pan, I started to scramble them around and incorporate them into the rice. This will add a lot of richness to the dish.  And you may not notice it when eating fried rice, but it has eggs in it.

I topped it all with sliced green onions for a little color, and some chopped peanuts for texture.  And even though I was just heating up some frozen appetizers, I still felt the need to make my own dipping sauce.  I do that quite often.  I used sweet & sour sauce (very traditional by itself), but then added soy sauce, teriyaki, honey, spicy mustard, a little lime juice, and chili sauce.  You can use brown sugar instead of honey if you'd like.  The acidity from the lime is nice, and you get sweetness from the honey, spiciness from the mustard and chili sauce, and earthly flavors from soy & teriyaki.

(Obviously I stirred it up first.)