Quick Lunch: Mackerel Fried Rice

One of the pleasures of having a day off is making a quick lunch from things in the fridge and pantry. While I don't have a wok and was too hungry to brown this more thoroughly, it was still tasty. It was also a welcome reminder of how easy and fulfilling it is to cook.

1-1/2 T vegetable oil
2 fat scallions
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup day-old rice
2 T soy sauce, plus more to taste
1 4.375 oz. tin of mackerel (this one was water-packed), flaked

Over high heat, quickly saute the scallions and garlic.

Add the rice, stirring constantly until it's coated with the oil.

Add the soy sauce and mackerel and cook till the fish and scallions are starting to brown.

Enjoy!

Today's Bento

I've steamed other things in my rice cooker before, so I'm not sure why it took me so long to wilt young spinach leaves in a strainer while my sausages boiled. While the magic bag is definitely handy, I'll have to start timing various veggies in both the cooker and atop a boiling saucepan of something else.

So, today I'm having:

• 2 lamb sausages (tasty on their own, but with a small container of spicy vinegar for added kick)
• garlic steamed rice
• baby spinach

They all fit together nicely in a square plastic container. I'll probably grab a banana at some point today as well.

The Seasonal Bento

My lunch looks like fall, today: fluffy white rice; soft yellow-green sauteed artichokes, interspersed with golden-brown bits of garlic and garnished with a bright yellow lemon slice; dappled tan and Maillard-brown sausages, speckled with green inside. The most intense colors congegrated in the top container: deep purple and brown Nicoise olives, five dark green cornichons and two red waxen mini-wheels of Laughing Cow cheese.

Fried Rice with Saffron, Ginger and Tomatoes

Have never cooked with saffron before, and so couldn't resist adding this recipe (from Serious Eats) to the fried rice chronicles. It turned out a tad too brassy from the healthy dollops of salt and pepper (mistakenly heavy in the case of the latter), but still flavorful and good served cold the next day. Will definitely try it again with a couple of modifications (in parentheses); may also adopt this method of cooking the egg for fried rice.

• small pinch of saffron (used two)
• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup olive oil, divided
• 1/2 cup tomatoes, pureed
• 1-1/2 tsp. ginger, minced (used 2-1/2 tsp.)
• 1/2 cup onion, chopped
• 1/2 cup frozen peas (used about 2/3 cup)
• 1-1/4 tsp. salt (will halve this next time)
• 1/4 tsp. pepper (will actually use this next time - ended up with about 1 tsp.)
• 3 cups cooked rice, crumbled
• 1/4 tsp. oyster sauce
• 1/3 cup scallions, chopped
• soy sauce to taste (skipped this)

Put saffron in a small bowl with 1 tbsp. water. Stir gently, then set aside.
Put 1 tbsp. oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Crack egg into a bowl and whisk in 1 tbsp. water. When skillet's hot, pour in the egg, tilting the pan to spread it so it coats the bottom (like an omelet). Once the egg has set, which should take somewhere between 2-4 minutes, scrape the egg into a bowl and break up into bite-sized pieces.
Pour the rest of the oil into the skillet and turn the heat to high. When it's hot, add the ginger; cook for about 15-30 seconds, stirring often.

Add the saffron water and tomato puree. Cook, stirring often, till most of the water evaporates - about 3-5 minutes.

Add the sliced onions. Cook for one minute.

Add the rice, salt, pepper and oyster sauce. Cook for 2 more minutes, stirring to homogenize the mixture.

Add the peas and cooked egg. Stir for another minute.

Add soy sauce to taste and garnish with scallions.

Hainanese Chicken with Rice, Bittman Style

Followed the recipe for the most part - variations in italics, though I didn't include the alternate pan-cooking of the rice and just went straight to the cooker. Decided to not halve the broth recipe because I'm doing close enough to the full measure of rice (in the cooker) and want the delicious chicken juices for other recipes. My variations in parentheses and italics, just cos that's the way I roll. Apropos of nothing, I'm having way too much fun watching Colbert and listening to John and Bradley debate the fine points of ambush journalism as I type this.

• one 3-4 lb. chicken, cut into pieces (2 lbs. of thighs, which is 4 of them)
• 3 tbsp. garlic, roughly chopped and divided (4 tbsp.)
• 5 slices fresh ginger, smashed (10)
• 1/4 cup peanut oil (1/8)
• 2 cups rice (a scant 2c.)
• 2 tbsp. dark sesame oil
• 1/2 cup ginger-scallion sauce (recipe follows below)
• 2 cups peeled, seeded and diced cucumber
• 2 tomatoes, sliced
• chopped fresh scallion and/or cilantro

Rub the chicken with the salt and half of the garlic and ginger (I also slipped some garlic and ginger underneath the skin). Meanwhile, boil 4 cups of water in a large pot. When the water boils, put the chicken in the pot; it should be barely submerged (add or subtract more water as necessary, then make sure it's boiling). Cover, reduce the heat to medium, and cook for 10 minutes (I cooked for 15, but those thighs were fat). Turn off the heat and keep the chicken in the water for at least 1 hour, covered. The meat should be opaque all the way to the bone - if it isn't, return to a boil and cook for another 5 minutes.

Leave the chicken be, or remove it from the stock, whichever you prefer.

Put the neutral oil in a skillet over medim heat. When it's hot, add the remaining garlic and ginger. Cook, stirring occasionally, till the garlic begins to brown (3-4 minutes).

Pour the oil-garlic-ginger mixture into your rice cooker. Add the rice and enough broth from the chicken (it was about 3-1/4 cups for me), and start cooking.

Carve the chicken however you wish (with or without bones), then rub with dark sesame oil. Serve as you choose - Bittman advocates drizzling some of the sauce over the chicken and serving it over the rice with the tomato and cucumber, while I am probably going to pack it straight into my Bento and keep the sauce in tiny Tupperwares on the side.

Ginger-Scallion Sauce (again from Bittman, with variations in italics)

While this sauce is lovely on its own, the accidental addition of some red pepper flakes worked well.

• 1/4 cup minced ginger
• 1/2 cup scallions
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1/4 tsp. red pepper flakes
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/2 cup neutral oil (I used peanut)

Mix the first five ingredients together in a heatproof bowl.

In a pan, heat the oil over high till it smokes. Pour the oil over the ginger-scallion mixture, mix well, and serve or store.

Tonight's Dinner - The Fried Rice Chronicles, Vol. 3

Leftovers, ho! While, sadly, I ate the green beans before remembering that fried rice was an option, the tuna and a nearly-dead shallot were welcome additions. Skipped the egg this time.

• 2 tbsp. peanut oil
• 1 heaping tsp. garlic, chopped
• 1 heaping tsp. ginger, minced
• 2 heaping tbsp. scallion, chopped, plus some minced scallion for garnish
• 1 tsp. shallot, chopped
• 1-1/2-2 cups day-old rice, mashed and de-clumpified (a fork works well)
• 3 or so oz. leftover seared tuna, chopped
• 1 tbsp. soy sauce
• salt and pepper to taste

Place oil in a skillet or pan, preferably nonstick, then turn the heat to high. Wait a minute or so, then add garlic, ginger, scallions and shallots. Cook, stirring almost constantly, for about a minute.

Turn the heat down to medium-high. Add the rice, de-clumping with your hands if you haven't already. Stir often for 1-2 minutes.

Add the chopped tuna and stir until no longer red. Add the soy sauce and stir till it's incorporated into the rice. Correct seasoning.

Garnish with scallions and serve.

Now that that's all in my belly, let's see if I actually get around to cooking my chicken or succumb to satiation and/or food coma.

Tomorrow's Bento

I've not been as remiss with the cooking as it may seem. For one thing, John has been doing a lot of cooking for us lately, including a lovely chicken dish with tomatoes, roasted red peppers, basil and orzo and a delicious by-the-Bittman bolognese sauce just a couple of days ago. For another, I've been mostly repeating old standards or rushing through too-simple-to-be-written-up dishes. Not that these are excuses.

At any rate, here are the contents of tomorrow's Mr. Bento, from top to bottom:

1. Cherry tomatoes with Laughing Cow cheese wheels
2. Artichoke hearts sauteed with garlic, anchovies and crushed red pepper flakes (next time, I'll add more garlic, dry the [canned] 'chokes more thoroughly and try to get a bit more caramelization going)
   
3. Garlic steamed rice (a new favorite: When making rice with a rice cooker, add a small head of garlic - this particular time I used about 9 cloves, peeled and crushed but not minced - to the rice and water, then cook as normal. The rice around the garlic develops a faint tinge of sweetness, and the cloves themselves remain whole but can be mashed wonderfully into the rest of it)
4. Boiled sausages with spicy suka (Filipino cane vinegar infused with garlic and chiles)
   

The Fried Rice Chronicles, Vol. 2: The Meh Lab [MEH]

Time to clear out the sundries and dispose of excess day-old rice again. The final product turned out...alright, I guess. Lessons learned? More garlic. More anchovies. Frozen peas instead of canned, because khaki is a color that should be worn, not eaten.

Ah well. At least I got the idea for a new tag out of it.

• 3 tbsp. peanut oil
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 small carrot (about 1/2 cup), diced
• 4 anchovy fillets, minced
• 3-4 garlic cloves, chopped (about 1 tbsp.)
• 1 cup peas
• 3-4 cups day-old rice, well-crumbled
• salt and freshly-ground pepper to taste
• 3-4 scallions, chopped

Beat the eggs and set them aside (NOTE: The 2nd egg I cracked was my first-ever double yolker!).

Put the oil in the Dutch oven on high heat. When hot, add the onion and carrots. Cook for a minute or two, then add the anchovies. Turn down the heat if necessary and stir relentlessly for a minute or two more, till the anchovies are evenly distributed and at the point of disintegration; the vegetables should be soft, but not brown.

Add peas; stir around till warmed.

Add garlic. Cook, stirring, for 30 seconds or so (as Bittman advised, I wanted to keep the garlic flavor strong).

Add rice, stirring to coat it thoroughly with oil and distribute the vegetables. Cook for a few minutes, till rice is heated through.

Dig a well in the middle of the rice, and pour the egg into it. Belay the stirring and cook for a minute or so, until some of the eggs begin to solidify at the bottom, but the rest is still liquidy (maybe a minute?). Then, rapidly stir the egg into the rice mixture. (Bittman likes to scramble them fairly thoroughly before incorporating them into the rest of the dish, but I like the creamy, faux-risotto-y texture this method produces).

Season with salt and pepper; correct seasonings if necessary. Remove from heat.

Garnish with scallions and serve.

The Fried Rice Chronicles, Vol. 1: Allium Uber Alles

Fried rice is an easy and often delicious way to use up leftovers or near-spoiling sundries. This time, we had a sad little carrot and various softening members of the allium family (the only reason there weren't any leeks was because I never leave any uncooked - witness the previous entry. This was the first time I'd tried making it in my Le Creuset dutch oven (thanks, Tita Tessie!) instead of in the nonstick one (R.I.P., my friend) I was used to (yes, I bought a wok years ago; no, I haven't gotten around to unpacking and seasoning it yet). It turned out well - both taste testers were very complimentary, though John wondered if I should add the egg even later in the cooking process. Anyway....

• 4 cups day-old rice, crumbled
• 3 tbsp. peanut oil
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 carrot, diced
• 1 large shallot, chopped
• 4 cloves garlic (about 1 heaping tbsp.), chopped
• 2 eggs
• salt and freshly-ground pepper to taste
• 1-1/2 to 2 tbsp. soy sauce or more, to taste
• 5 scallions, chopped

Beat the eggs and set them aside.

Put the oil in the Dutch oven on high heat. When hot, add the onion and carrots. Cook for a few minutes, turning the heat down if necessary, till vegetables are soft but not browned.

Add shallot. Cook, stirring, for a minute or so more.

Add garlic. Cook, stirring, for 30 seconds or so (as Bittman advised, I wanted to keep the garlic flavor strong).

Add rice, stirring to coat it thoroughly with oil and distribute the vegetables. Cook for a few minutes, till rice is heated through.

Dig a well in the middle of the rice, and pour the egg into it. Belay the stirring and cook for a minute or so, until some of the eggs begin to solidify at the bottom, but the rest is still liquidy (maybe a minute?). Then, rapidly stir the egg into the rice mixture. (Bittman likes to scramble them fairly thoroughly before incorporating them into the rest of the dish, but I like the creamy, faux-risotto-y texture this method produces).

Add soy sauce; mix thoroughly. Add salt and pepper to taste; correct seasonings.

Remove from heat; stir in scallions - or leave them on top as a garnish, if you prefer. I like some of them ever so slightly cooked.