Rice-plosion!

So today I would like to introduce you to something magical. "rice-plosion." That's right people it sounds ridiculous and it is. It is essentially whatever is in my fridge mixed with rice...please interpret that in the most delicious sounding way possible. Anyway! Rice-plosion is basically improvised fried rice. You can thank Dan and Andy for the name. They came up with it during one of their wild culinary adventures. Rice-plosion is fantastic because even though it's different every time, it's simple and you can literally use whatever you have.

(Click after the picture to read the rest!)

Last night we had frozen veggies (corn, peas, and carrots), ground beef, eggs, and onions. Oh, and rice of course. I don't have any measurements in this recipe because you can add how much or how little of anything you want. This is two cups of rice, one pound of ground beef, half an onion, and maybe 1/2 cup of frozen veggies. First things first- gotta make the rice. Look at my cute little rice cooker! So small and cute and Japanese!

And it's ok if you don't have a rice cooker, rice is easy to make in a pot too. Here's a tutorial on the best way. Preferably you should use basmati rice because it won't stick together, but if you don't have basmati rice, that's ok. Same goes for chicken broth, if you have it, cook your rice in that. If not, that's cool, just stick with water. This is all about emptying the pantry! We have this mexican chicken stuff so i threw that in there.

Ok the next step is something that I've found works really well to make fried rice. If you take the really really hot rice and throw it right into the frying pan, it will stick together and turn into a ball of mush. And that sucks! So don't do that. What you should do is take a fork and dump the rice into a big tupperware. Then stick it in the fridge. (Or the freezer if you're super hungry and want to eat asap.) You don't want to start frying until the rice is cool, so just check on it every now and then and move it around with the fork so it all gets equally cooled.

So while the rice is cooling, go chop up an onion. If you have your ground beef frozen like we do, make sure it's defrosted!

Woohoo! Rice is finally cool! Lets cook it up! Put a pan over medium heat and throw a little butter in there. Then once the butter is melted, put the onions in there too. Let them cook down for a few minutes, and then add the ground beef. (And if you don't have meat, or you're a vegetarian, just skip this step.) smash it up a bit with your spoon and let it get thoroughly brown. Once it's brown drain the oil out of the pan. you don't want all that fat and grease in your rice. gross. beef juice bad. butter good.

Anyway! Add the rice now and you're probably also going to want to add more butter so that the rice gets brown and crispy and delicious. Keep stirring it around, making sure all the rice is getting butter and heat. Then add whatever fresh or frozen veggies you have. (If they're fresh, make sure that they're at least mostly cooked before hand.)

After a few minutes, go grab a couple of eggs from the fridge. The trick here is to make a well in the middle of the pan. Scoot all the rice around to the edges and crack the eggs right into the middle of the pan. Then scramble 'em up quick! Once the eggs are cooked, mix them into the rice.

Now it's time to season it! Around here, we like to use "Pappy Spice," a spice mix that Dan's dad gave us. (He makes it himself!) It's a combo of basil, salt, pepper, onion powder, garlic powder, chili powder, and Italian seasoning. It's amazing.

But since you guys probably don't have Pappy Spice, you can use any combination of the spices above, whatever you happen to have. Definitely use basil, it really adds to it. Or, if you like your fried rice more asian, put some soy sauce on it and skip out on the basil/italian seasonings.

Let it cook a little more so that the seasoning really cooks in there.

You're done! Serve it up and dig in!

XOXO

Natalie