Finding Comfort in Three Traditions: Grace's Fried Rice

Passport & Plate - Grace's Nasi Goreng

Indonesia | Friday, March 6, 2015 | 5 photos

Ingredients
+ 1 cup cooked rice (*any kind, I like Japanese white rice best)
+ ½ onion (*minced)
+ 2 cloves of garlic (*minced)
+ 1 1-inch piece of ginger root (*chopped)
+ cilantro (*or parsley. used for garnish)
+ 3 large carrots
+ 4 eggs
+ 6 slices of thick bacon
+ 1 lemon (*cut in to wedges)
+ pinch of curry powder
+4 tablespoons of soy sauce
+ ¼ cup of frozen peas

 

How to prepare this recipe
Start by cooking the rice. While the rice cooks, chop the onion, garlic cloves, ginger root, and carrots. Thoroughly cook the bacon until crispy. Remove from heat and tear into small pieces. Set aside.

Saute the onions, ginger, and garlic until crispy in a pan with a little oil (I like mine until they are almost burnt!). After onions, garlic, and ginger are crispy in the oil, add the carrots. Cook until soft. After the rice is cooked through, add the rice to the pan. Stir together and cook until rice gets a little harder and add the soy sauce and a pinch of the Indian curry powder. Stir together and then add frozen peas. Once the peas are added, stir a few times and then remove from heat.

In a separate pan, fry one egg at a time in oil. Add one egg to each plate of rice.
Garnish with cilantro or parsley, bacon bits, and a wedge of lemon.

Enjoy!

 

The story behind this recipe
When I think of my primary comfort foods and the foods that I always make for my friends and family, I always go back to fried rice. When I was young, I lived with teachers from Japan for ten years. Although I am from North Carolina and was raised by American parents, I grew up speaking Japanese and eating Japanese food. Over the years, fried rice became a staple food for me. To this day, my Mom's favorite breakfast food is cold fried rice in the morning. This particular recipe for rice draws on three separate food traditions. The first is the influence Japanese food had on me and my palate. I ate copious amounts of rice and seaweed growing up and I find I am just as obsessed with these ingredients now. The second influence comes from my Mom. In addition to being a remarkable gardener and beekeeper, she is a fantastic cook. Born and raised in the south, my mom, made sure to feed us a reasonable amount of bacon, butter, and biscuits, in addition to healthier foods from her garden. The final influence comes from Indonesia. In the summer of 2013, I packed a bag and moved to Yogyakarta, Indonesia. There, I lived in a small village and quickly rediscovered the beauty of nasi goreng dan telur (fried rice with egg). I found that I ate this dish every day and without it I felt at a loss. The remarkable thing about fried rice is its ability to make something old (*old eggs, oil, rice, or vegetables) and make it new. My particular dish draws on inspirations from each of these influences and also takes a creative spin on a much-celebrated traditional dish. In my recipe, I include spices I bought in India, southern bacon from a farm in North Carolina (where I live and go to school), and ginger from my local food co-op. I find that fried rice is one of my greatest comfort foods and like my mother, I am often found eating day-old fried rice for breakfast.