Prawns Fried Rice

An Indo Chinese style of preparing Prawns Fried Rice!!!  An easy and flavourful recipe with pure Chinese taste and aroma and without adding any sauces or tastemakers.

 

Ingredients:-

Prawns                                           - 250gm

Pepper powder                              - ½ tsp

Red Chilly powder                        - ¼ tsp

Garlic, finely chopped                  - 3 tbsp

Ginger, finely chopped                 - 1 tbsp

Raw Basmati Rice or any Biriyani Rice – 250 gm

Water                                                - 1.5 ltr

Egg                                                 - 2

Any sunflower oil              

Salt to taste

Vegetables

Carrot, finely chopped                 - 1 cup

Beans, finely chopped                  - 1 cup

Capsicum, finely chopped           - 1 cup

Spring onion, chopped                 - ½ cup

Celery, chopped                             - ½ cup

For Garnishing

Spring onion, chopped                 - ¼ cup

In Chinese recipes, we have to give more time for preparing ingredients than the actual cooking. If all the ingredients are ready, it takes only 5 to 10 min of cooking. Here also, we have to arrange chilled boiled rice, chilled vegetables, shredded egg etc by our side before we switch on the flame for mixing them together. So, lets have a look on how to prepare above mentioned ingredients suitable for making a pure Chinese Fried Rice.

Preparations:-

Rice

•    Boil 1.5 ltr water and add raw rice. Add salt to taste. Add 1 tbsp oil to avoid sticking. Don’t wait till the rice is fully cooked. When it is almost cooked (80%), remove from fire and drain water completely. 
•    Let the cooked rice cool at room temperature. Then transfer the rice into the refrigerator. Chill it well for at least 1 hour. This helps to stay the rice firm even after mixing with the vegetables and thus giving a nice look at the end.

Prawns, Vegetables and Egg.

·        Keep the finely chopped vegetables in the refrigerator for 1 hour.

·        In a pressure cooker, cook prawns with ¼ tsp red chilli powder, ¼ tsp pepper powder, salt and 3 tbsp of water , just for 2 whistles. You can use a pot also, for cooking prawns instead of a pressure cooker.

·        In a non stick pan, heat 2 tbsp oil and sauté cooked prawns. 

·        When all the sides are almost fried, add the chopped vegetables (taken directly from the refrigerator) and sauté for 5 minutes. Add salt to taste. 

·        As the vegetables are chilled, it will stay fresh even after 5 min sautéing.

·        Transfer prawns and vegetables together into a plate. Keep it aside. Don’t turn of the pan.

·        Beat egg with ¼ tsp pepper powder and salt.

·        In the same pan, add 1 tsp oil and add egg mixture. Stir continuously to get egg as shredded.

·        Transfer the shredded egg into the same plate containing prawns and vegetables. Keep them aside.

Now, lets start cooking.....

Method:-

·        In a Kadai, or a non stick pan, heat 4 tbsp oil and sauté finely chopped garlic.

·        Add finely chopped ginger.

·        When it becomes a light golden colour, add chilled rice (taken directly from the refrigerator) and sauté well. The rest 20 % cooking of rice will be happened at this time.

·        After 5 min, add cooked prawns, vegetables and egg into the rice and mix well.

·        
       Don’t use a spatula/spoon to mix them. Better you rotate the pan using its handle for mixing the ingredients. Otherwise the rice will become mushy.

·        Garnish with spring onion and serve hot with any suitable side dishes like Chilly chicken, Veg manjurian etc.

From my experience, we can simply bring the pure Chinese taste using garlic, capsicum, spring onion and celery. We don’t need Aginomoto(MSG), or any other tastemakers . Thats why I am adding 3 tbsp of chopped garlic as the first ingredient to the oil. Then the oil becomes rich in garlic flavour and when you add rice to it, you will get the rice well blended with that nice Chinese aroma. That is the magic of Garlic!!!

Tips:-

Dont use coconut oil for preparing Chinese dishes.

Adding too much carrot will change the rice  into a light orange in colour.