Chinese Biryani...wait what?

Orange Chicken, Rice and Roast Pork Bun

So tonight I knew I wanted something Asian, but didn't know what. I found that I had some basmati rice in the cupboard and then had some Trader Joes Orange Chicken, which by the way is much easier than making from scratch. Anyway...this was a very easy and surprisingly fairly quick recipe for the rice, maybe an hour, and that includes boiling the rice and then frying it.

So first things first, wash the rice. Wash it you say? Yes, I said wash it. Put about a cup of rice in a mesh strainer and run some water over it and use your hand to whirl it around, you will see the cloudy water running out, wash for about a minute and transfer to a small pot. Fill the pot with water, if its still really cloudy, whirl the rice around again and dump off the water. The reason for all of this is you don't want mushy, clumpy fried rice. You want rice kernels that are separated from each other and that is what you will get with this method.

So the next thing you will need to find are vegetables. You can really put whatever you like in here. I had some napa cabbage hanging around, a ton of green beans from the garden and some onion, chopped it all up and voila. I also used an extra lean chinese sausage, but you can use any meat you want.

1 cup white rice (should magically transform into 2 cups when cooked)
1 egg
handful green beans, chopped

Biryani Before Sauce

1 medium onion, chopped
2 cups chopped cabbage
1 extra lean chinese sausage, chopped
1-2 cloves chopped garlic
1 tsp ginger, freshly grated
1/4 cup low sodium soy sauce
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tbsp sherry wine (you can probably skip the oyster and sherry, but increase the soy)
1 tbsp canola or olive oil
cooking spray

Start by mixing the soy sauce, oyster sauce garlic and ginger in a small bowl, set aside.

Next heat the oil in a very large pan or wok, I used a non stick paella pan for this, although it still stuck a little. When hot, add (meat first if using it) vegetables, starting with the beans and onions and end with the cabbage. Spread the vegetable mix around the perimeter of the pan and lightly spray the middle for the egg. Add the egg and scramble, add to the perimeter. Spray the middle again or even add a little more oil if you want and then add the rice. The temperature should be fairly high, I'd say medium to medium high, keep the rice moving around and gradually pull the vegetable mixture in from the sides, making sure nothing sticks to the pan.

Slowly pour the sauce mix over the rice and stir to coat evenly. The rice should still not stick and there should be plenty of sauce for the whole pan. The heat should still be fairly high as you want the water to evaporate from the rice, and eventually the rice will look just like fried rice yummm!