Vegetable Fried Rice
Vegetable fried rice - this easy vegan fried rice is a great quick meal or side dish. It's simple to make, loaded with vegetables and full of flavour. You can swap the vegetables to suit you, and add tofu or vegan chicken for an all in one meal.
Servings 4 people
Ingredients
- 300 g (1 ½ cups) uncooked white rice (long grain or basmati)
- 2 Tbsp soy sauce
- 1 Tbsp shaoxing wine
- 2 tsp sesame oil
- 1 tsp MSG
- ¼ tsp salt
- a good pinch white pepper
- 2 Tbsp vegetable or peanut oil
- 1 onion peeled and finely chopped
- 1 large carrot diced
- 1 red bell pepper deseeded and diced
- 160 g (5 ½ oz) sugarsnap peas sliced
- 130 g (1 cup) frozen peas
- 4 cloves garlic peeled and crushed
- 3 spring onions (scallions) thinly sliced
Instructions
- Cook the rice according to the instructions on the packet. Ideally you should do this in advance, allow the rice to cool slightly and then refrigerate it in until needed. You can use it right away if you are short on time or will want to store any leftover fried rice however.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the soy sauce, shaoxing wine, sesame oil, MSG, salt and white pepper.
- Heat the vegetable oil in a wok over a medium heat. Add the onion and cook for about 3 minutes.
- Turn the heat up to high and add the carrot, pepper, sugarsnaps, peas and garlic. Cook for 3-5 minutes, stirring almost constantly, until the vegetables are just tender.
- Add the cooked rice. If you are using cold rice then break it up with your hands before adding it to the wok.
- Cook for about 3 minutes, stirring constantly. Pour in the soy sauce mixture and stir well to coat the rice. Cook for another minute then stir in the spring onions, taste and add more soy sauce/salt/pepper/MSG as needed and serve right away.
Notes
- For the best textured fried rice you need to use cold (cooked) rice, not hot rice. I either cook the rice the day beforehand or in the morning, allow it to cool slightly then fridge it until needed (get it in the fridge as soon as possible to avoid bacteria growing). That's not to say that you can't cook the rice and use it right away, but it may end up with a more mushy texture. Old rice is drier so doesn't clump together as much, giving you perfectly fried grains.
- If you used precooked and chilled rice to make this vegetable fried rice then I don't recommend storing and reheating any leftovers. The more times that rice is reheated and chilled, the more likely that bacteria will grow and cause food poisoning.
- If however, you cooked the rice and fried it right away, then any leftovers will keep in an airtight container in the fridge for a couple of days. Reheat thoroughly to serve.
- Make sure that you have everything ready to go - all your vegetables chopped, seasonings to hand etc. before you start frying. This vegetable fried rice cooks very quickly and you don't want to end up burning it because you are trying to prepare things as you go.