Fried Rice Paradise

My first attempt at cooking fried rice was at home econs class in Secondary One. I didn't pay much attention. The only thing I remember was that we had to slice chillies for garnish. I don't remember how my fried rice tasted. Probably not very good, despite the lovely garnish, or I would have attempted it again.

My second attempt was not until my first year at University. I was missing home badly, and Oxford was unusually cold that winter. I was craving fried rice, even though it was not one of my favourite dishes.

I didn't have a recipe and of course had clean forgotten my hone econs lesson. In those days (gosh I am sounding old!), the internet was primitive and one couldn't just look up the recipe online. I was not yet experienced in cooking, but I thought, "How hard can it be? It's just frying some rice in a wok with eggs, mixed veg and Chinese sausage right?" of course, I screwed it up. I added the eggs last (why? I don't know.) and the fried rice ended up a soggy mess. I was upset and never tried it again. But went on to cook many other different and probably more complicated dishes.

Until.

Seven years later, I discovered that my husband, a non-cook, could whip up a mean dish of fried rice!! The only other dish he "cooks" is a bagel sandwich with bacon. I enjoyed his fried rice tremendously and was happy to let him take the lead on his dish. But in time, I realized that it wasn't that hard a dish to cook. I observed him, read some recipes, and finally cooked a decent version of fried rice.

Now, I cook it regularly. My kids love it, and I find that it is the perfect dish to cook when I have too many scraps of food in the fridge. It keeps really well, so I can have leftovers for lunch the next day. And it takes little effort, oh except for the turning and breaking up of the cold rice. Once in awhile, I enjoy making complicated delicate dishes, but now that I am managing the household on my own, I have no time for complicated. And I find that there is an inverse relationship between how complicated a dish is to make, and how well kids take to it.

I don't have a fixed recipe. But it generally includes onions, garlic, eggs (which always go in before the rice) scraps of leftover meat (ham, sausages, luncheon meat, roast chicken etc.), scraps of veg left that need to be cooked coz they are losing their freshness/are not enough to make one meal (or frozen mixed veg) and leftover cold rice. I will add soya sauce (light and dark) and/or oyster sauce and sesame oil. The type of sauce and amount will depend on the ingredients and my mood. I never have chili as a garnish.

So we have fried rice once a week. I have a version of cha-pa-lang pasta that I make on another night (also keeps well for lunch). So that's at least four meals accounted for!