Java rice

Fried rice turned orange by annatto oil made first, not by a powder stirred in at the end.

Not vegetarian — contains fish sauce. Everything else in it is vegetarian, so it becomes a vegetarian dish if you use vegetarian fish sauce — which is sold, including by Thai brands.

Ingredients

• 800 g cold cooked rice, grains separated
• 2 tablespoons annatto seeds
• 4 tablespoons oil
• 0.5 teaspoon ground turmeric
• 4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 teaspoon fish sauce
• 0.5 teaspoon black pepper
• 2 spring onions, sliced

Method

1. ANNATTO OIL, MADE FIRST. Warm the oil and the annatto seeds together over the lowest heat for 4 minutes, until the oil is deep orange, then strain the seeds out and throw them away. Left in, they go bitter in the pan; and the colour has to be in the fat before the rice meets it, or you get orange specks on white grains.
2. The rice must be cold and a day old. Warm rice is wet rice, and wet rice fries to porridge.
3. Turmeric into the warm annatto oil off the heat, 30 seconds. It needs fat and it burns in seconds over a flame.
4. Garlic and onion into the oil over a medium heat, 3 minutes, until soft but not coloured.
5. Heat up to high. Rice in all at once. Press it flat with the back of the spatula, leave it 30 seconds, then turn it. Repeat for 4 minutes. Constant stirring steams it; pressing and leaving fries it.
6. Butter in at the end, in pieces, tossed through until it has just melted. In early it browns and the rice tastes of scorched dairy.
7. Fish sauce and pepper. Spring onion off the heat.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Philippines · All recipes