Ginger-Fried Rice

I hated eggs when I was a kid – absolutely, truly loathed them.

Boy have things changed. The changeover was so gradual, it was invisible to me. A little bite of quiche (wow!), a taste of deviled eggs (yum!), tiny bits of yolk on an over-medium egg (ooh!), and I was slowly wooed. Learning to cook eggs myself took the scare factor out of the yolks (good lesson if you, like I, have a child who hates eggs). Eventually, over many years, I’ve come to adore eggs, to crave them in fact, in iterations I could never have imagined eating, like my version of huevos rancheros, basically an over-easy egg atop a crispy corn tortilla with enchilada sauce. Beyond good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Or this Jean-George Vongerichten recipe, which caught my eye a couple of weeks back. Mark Bittman wrote about it in the NYTimes, and did a nifty little accompanying video, and when I saw both I knew I would love this deceptively simple fried rice. Topped with an egg, and garnished with crispy bits of ginger and garlic, as well as a drizzle each of soy sauce and sesame oil, it has it all – comfort, salty-crunch, and umami all over the place (soy sauce, sesame oil, crispy-at-the-edges egg). It makes beautiful use of leftover rice, but is so addictively good, it’s well worth making a fresh pot (let the rice cool uncovered and dry out a bit).

Glance at the recipe and you’ll realize it’s easy to adjust for just one or two servings (vs. four). You could probably even use leftover already-fried rice (although the simple leek-rice combination is lovely, make sure to try it) – the key is the garnish of crispy ginger and garlic (above), as well as the drizzle of soy sauce and sesame oil. I plan to deliciously riff on this theme for years to come. Recipe here.