squaremeals | Cooking is Terrible: Rice and Pasta Toppings (Reply)

More recipes from Cooking is Terrible. I haven't tried all of these yet.

Pasta:
If you want extra-delicious pasta, or if you want something very simple and
good for upset stomachs, boil your pasta in stock or broth.

Butter flavoured margerine, Garlic oil
Equal parts nut butter + soy sauce +
vinegar, plus a little honey (+ chopped cucumber) (+ roasted salted nuts or
sunflower seeds)
Cubed chicken + cucumber + soy sauce + sesame oil (+ onion oil) (+ sesame or sunflower seeds) (+ coriander)
Tomato + boiled egg + olives + oil +citric acid + chicken/tuna
spinach + corn + salad dressing or oil and vinegar + bacon+ zucchini

Rice:

You can use stock instead of water, or add a tablespoon or two of
butter or flavored oil, or cook in part water and part nut milk.

Butter + soy sauce
Butter + cinnamon + sugar
>Tahini + citric acid (+ misc roasted or pickled veg)
Egg, cracked directly into hot rice and
beaten + soy sauce
Miso, either dissolved in a bit of
water or mixed directly into the rice

Crispy Rice and Eggs

Heat butter or oil in a skillet.
Add cold cooked rice—not freshly cooked, but out of a packet or out of the
fridge—to the skillet. Cover loosely with something like a splatter shield or a
piece of foil. Leave over med-low heat (actually important here—you want it to
dry out and get golden, and higher heat just burns) for about ten minutes,
until the rice starts to smell kinda like toast.

The length of time this takes
depends entirely on your particular stove and your pan—I have a gas range and a
cast iron skillet, and will sometimes start this cooking over the lowest heat
possible, go have a quick shower, and then come back to finish it.

Anyhow, when things smell toasty,
stir the rice, and leave to toast on the other side. When your rice is crunchy
and brown in places, shove it aside, and fry an egg.

Warning: sometimes, depending on
the rice, it can pop and spit in the pan. This is always very alarming, but
it’s ok and a thing that’s meant to happen. Don’t try to cook this if you’re
feeling super on edge, tho, and always be aware that the hot rice can jump, and
it hurts if it lands on you.

Serve the egg over the rice, maybe
drizzling both with soy sauce. (+ green onions) (+ avocado)

Variation: If you hate eggs, I
rather like cutting tofu into thick slabs and cooking it with the rice. It gets
crispy on the outside and, if you’ve cut it thick, stays soft in the middle,
which is a pleasing textural contrast.

Bacon Fried Rice

If you have the energy, cut some
bacon up into pieces and fry it up in a skillet. If not, get some of pre-cooked
bacon and warm that up in a skillet, then add some butter. Add a chopped onion,
and let it cook until the onion’s gone soft.

Tip in some frozen peas, and also
some old rice—not freshly cooked, but from a packet, or stuff that’s been
allowed to dry out in the fridge a little. Let the rice start to brown while
you beat an egg or two with some soy sauce.

Pour the egg into the skillet and
stir it through the rice. It’s done as soon as the egg is cooked enough for
your taste.