I tried a variation of fried rice on Saturday and was pleased with my attempt. I still am. Curry was added to the dish to enhance the flavour. I got the idea from a recipe I came across in a cookbook but tossed additional ingredients for a more wholesome flavour. The original recipe didn’t specify the following but I added them anyway to improve the presentation and flavour of the dish: capsicums, mushrooms, purple cabbage, onions, pineapples and kecap manis or sweet soy sauce. The pineapples were a conincidence as there were some leftovers – overly ripe ones – in the fridge. Instead of chucking them out, why not cut down on wastage? So in the pineapples went. And I must say, the final result is awesome.
Here is the recipe for my signature dish of the week:
Ingredients
2 cups cold cooked rice
cooking oil
1 onion, sliced
4 cloves garlic, chopped (I have always liked using more)
half purple cabbage, chopped
6 mushrooms, sliced
half red capsicum, sliced
1/4 ripe pineapple, chopped
half cup green peas
half cup sweet corn
a sprig of spring onions, chopped
2 heaped tbsp curry powder
2 tbsp sweet soy sauce (kecap manis)
100g prawns, deshelled
1 tbsp soy sacue
pepper to taste
Method
1. Heat cooking oil in a wok.
2. Add the prawns till cooked on both sides. Pour the prawns and prawn residue into a bowl. Leave it aside.
3. Heat cooking oil in same wok.
4. Fry garlic till fragrant. Add in the sliced onions and fry till transparent.
5. Add in the following: capsicums, purple cabbage, green peas and sweet corn till they soften.
6. Add mushrooms, pineapples and spring onions till they mix well.
7. Add curry powder and mix well.
8. Instead of water, pour in the prawns and prawn stock/residue to add moisture.
9. Mix the rice part by part and blend it well.
10. Add kecap manis/sweet soy sauce and mix well.
11. Add soy sauce and pepper.
The dish has a good mix of flavour: savoury, sweet with a tinge of saltiness. It’s best not to let the saltiness of the soy overpower the curry. If you don’t fancy seafood, the rice also goes well with small pieces of chicken. The sweetness of sweet soy will smoothen out the savouriness of the curry and the result is phenomenal. A creative chef is not constrained by the recipe but enhances the food through the use of imagination, intuition and gut. A true chef thinks out of the box to whip out something original in his own right.
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