Shrimp Fried Rice
Shrimp Fried Rice. Rival any restaurant version and get all the helpful tips you need to make the easiest, fluffiest and most flavourful fried rice in your own home kitchen.
NOTE: Recipe links for the Sweet & Sour Sauce and the Crispy Garlic Garnish are included with the recipe below.
Take out foods at home is kind of one of our household specialties. On many occasions I have set out to beat a restaurant version of a recipe and most often succeeded.
Have you ever gone to eat and at the end thought, "I could have made that better at home"? Perhaps you haven't, but I often have.
It's one of those things that kind of gets under my skin and digs into my brain as a little irritation that won't go away. Many recipes on this blog have sprung from my irritated brain!
Most often the cure for my brain's vexation, is to do what those thoughts demand. Make it better at home.
The inspiration for this Shrimp Fried Rice.
Such was the case a few weeks ago when I also featured a new recipe for Egg Fried Rice.
Recently, I had just seen a restaurant video review from a local "influencer". (God how I hate that term!) They were reviewing a local Chinese Restaurant that we hadn't visited in years.
Perhaps they really had improved, I thought. Why not give it a try?
We did indeed order a few of our favourites and some were quite good, but one in particular did not hit the mark. The fried rice.
It was practically flavourless! It was pale, sticky and unappealing in appearance. There were few additions to the basic rice and frankly lacked any background flavour.
Time to add more fried rice dishes to Rock Recipes
Thinking about it, I had fallen into one of my old traps.
Often, with things like side dishes, I figure, everyone already has their own favourite recipe. Sometimes I miss the more common recipes because, for example with this dish, I think no-one is really looking for that kind of thing.
That kind of thinking I do need to dismiss more, because folks are often looking for techniques for simple recipes that will drastically improve them. This is a perfect example.
A couple of things to consider.
Proper rice cooking using day old or steamed off rice is essential, for instance. Using hot rice for fried rice, generally means a clumpy, sticky final dish. Not what you want.
A few essential ingredients like fish sauce, or toasted sesame oil, need mentioning too. Many people are not familiar with some ingredients but when added, can be instantly recognized as "that something missing" in their old recipe.
Add a couple of these types of ingredients and you will be well on your way to restaurant worthy dishes like this one! Follow all my tips here and let me know in the comments how it goes!
By the way, I put together a collection of some staple Asian cooking ingredients below, which I like to keep in hand at all times.
TOP TEN Asian Cooking Ingredients to keep on hand.
This recipe also makes use of some basic Asian cooking ingredients that I always keep in the fridge or cupboard. My TOP TEN Asian cooking ingredients that I always try to have on hand are:
- Hoisin sauce
- Fish sauce
- Toasted sesame oil
- Ginger root. ( I keep mine in the freezer and then easily grate it frozen)
- Rice wine vinegar.
- Five Spice powder.
- Low sodium soy sauce (recommended for all my recipes that call for it)
- Oyster Sauce
- Sesame seeds
- Crushed chili paste ( sambal oelek or similar)
Like this delicious side dish?
Be sure to check out another recent Asian inspired side dish, Sesame Garlic Noodles with Cashews.
Like this Shrimp Fried Rice recipe?
You'll find hundreds of other great ideas in our Asian Inspired Dishes Category and even more in our Chicken Recipes Category.
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Shrimp Fried Rice
Shrimp Fried Rice. Rival any restaurant version and get all the helpful tips you need to make the easiest, fluffiest and most flavourful fried rice in your own home kitchen.
Ingredients
- 4 cups cooked or long grain Jasmine rice, about 1 ½ cups of dry rice ( See Instruction #2)
- 6 oz medium sized shrimp chopped in small pieces
- 4 tablespoon vegetable or peanut oil (2 tablespoon are used in 2 separate steps)
- 3 large eggs, beaten
- Salt and pepper to season the eggs
- 2 tablespoon low sodium soy sauce
- 2 tablespoon fish sauce, (optional but recommended)
- 3 green onions, finely chopped
- ½ cup cooked green peas
- ½ cup diced red pepper
- 2 tsp toasted sesame oil
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- 1 teaspoon crushed chill paste (optional)
- Crispy garlic (optional) See link in notes. Or more chopped green onion for garnish.
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Instructions
- PLEASE NOTE: Photos of the recipe procedure steps appear in the body of the post above and in the notes below.
- NOTES BEFORE BEGINNING. Fried rice is generally made from leftover rice or rice made the previous day. If you want to speed up the process, cook your rice, then spread it in a cookie sheet to steam off and cool almost to room temperature. Stick the cookie sheet in the freezer for about 30-40 minutes to blast chill it. Then it is ready to use in the recipe.
- To begin with you will need 4 cups of cooked cold rice. Day old rice, that has been chilled in the fridge overnight is best. This goes a long way to preventing mushy fried rice. (See Notes for a quick method)
- Heat the vegetable oil in a wok or large sauté pan over medium heat.
- Beat the egg and add to the pan.
- Season with salt and pepper.
- Scramble only until the egg sets. Do not over cook.
- Remove the scrambled egg from the pan and set aside.
- Next, add the chopped shrimp to the wok and sauté just for a minute until they colour.
- Remove shrimp and set aside as well.
- Next turn the burner on high and add the other two tablespoons of oil and let it heat up for 30 seconds or so.
- Add the rice and press it down gently into the bottom of the wok.
- Let the rice fry there for a minute or so, then toss it, press down gently into the bottom of wok and repeat.
- Repeat this process a couple of more times. The idea is to dry out the rice as much as possible making it ready to absorb the flavours that are added next.
- After you’ve fried the rice sufficiently, add in the soy sauce and fish sauce.
- Toss the rice very well for a couple of minutes to ensure that this flavours are well incorporated throughout all the rice in the pan.
- Next add the cooked peas, chopped peppers and the green onions and toss well until the peas are well heated through.
- Finally sprinkle the black pepper evenly over the rice and drizzle in the toasted sesame oil.
- Add the chili flakes if you are using them.
- I like to use the full 2 teaspoon of sesame oil, but some find it very strong. Start slow, you can always add more if you like when tasting at the end.
- Toss well for a final two minutes to incorporate the sesame oil throughout.
- Serve with additional garnishes of green onions, sesame seeds and if you like our recipe for Crispy Garlic! See notes below
Notes
GET THE SWEET & SOUR SAUCE RECIPE HERE.
GET THE RECIPE FOR OUR CRISPY GARLIC HERE.
Ingredients for Shrimp Fried Rice.
Rinsing rice removes surface starch and helps prevent sticking.
Add the beaten egg to a hot wok.
Soft scramble egg.
Remove egg from oan when just set, not browned.
Add the shrimp to the hot wok.
Sauté shrimp pieces, just until they colour slightly.
Press the cooked rice down firmly into the wok.
Add the soy sauce to the rice.
Add the fish sauce to the rice.
Add the peppers and green onions.
Add the peas.
Add the egg and shrimp back to the wok and stir fry until heated through the rest f the rice. Serve immediately.
Nutrition Information
Yield
6Serving Size
1Amount Per Serving Calories 412Total Fat 15gSaturated Fat 3gUnsaturated Fat 12gCholesterol 154mgSodium 930mgCarbohydrates 54gFiber 2gSugar 3gProtein 16g
The nutritional information provided is automatically calculated by third party software and is meant as a guideline only. Exact accuracy is not guaranteed. For recipes where all ingredients may not be used entirely, such as those with coatings on meats, or with sauces or dressings for example, calorie & nutritional values per serving will likely be somewhat lower than indicated.
Rock Recipes a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. Our product recommendations are almost exclusively for those we currently use or have used in the past.
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