Spending months in dance class learning the steps of Salsa, three steps forward and three steps back, will hardly prepare you for a sweaty night at a Salsa club in Havana. The hip movement and impromptu twirls will leave you feeling like an outsider.
The technical steps you were taught in the safety of the studio with your teacher’s clear count, slowed down pace, and white washed music are used as mere framework. This feels completely foreign.
You may have learned the dance but you haven’t learned to dance. The latter takes experience, a willingness to fail, and time.
Knowing how to cook is the greatest improvisation. Working with what you have comes with experience as does substituting ingredients with ease and pairing flavors with confidence. It’s one of the main reasons people complain to me, “mine didn’t taste like yours.”
While I can give you exact measurements and ingredients, I almost always take liberties to improve the recipe, adding an extra couple of garlic cloves or subbing honey for maple syrup. These days, I rarely even use recipes.
I was in Cincinnati for the Asian Food Festival this past weekend. We sampled fried bananas, ube ice cream and mango popsicles. I highly suggest you check it out if you have the opportunity next year.
The consensus on the chicken fried rice was that mine is considerably better, which is funny, because mine is never the same. I use what I have when I’m trying to finish up scraps of produce languishing in the vegetable drawer. It’s the perfect meal to disguise imperfect produce.
This is one such recipe, or template, that I’ve developed over years of trial and error. Knowing this is a meal that needs to be fluid, I give measurements for vegetables and protein but don’t control which you use. That’s up to you —and the shadowy corners of your fridge.
When you have the freedom to substitute within a set of vague guidelines, it won’t always go well. There will be things that work and things that don’t. Like the time I put coffee grounds in chocolate mousse instead of brewed coffee as the recipe intended. It was, as you can imagine, inedibly grainy.
As in life, these failures will all contribute to your breadth of knowledge in the kitchen. As you build confidence, more things will work and fewer things will fail. You’ll be ready for the Salsa club in no time.
“But First, Food” columnist Whitney Kling is a recipe developer who lives in Southwest Ohio with her four kids, two cats and a food memoir that’s ever-nearing completion. If she’s not playing tennis or at a yoga class, she’s in the kitchen creating something totally addictive — and usually writing about it.
Almost Anything Fried Rice Template
This is a simple way to turn leftover rice into a well-rounded meal. The humble grain provides a backdrop for an assortment of finely chopped vegetables and streamlined seasonings. Get creative with the protein, by using whatever you have. Chicken, shrimp and tofu are all great options.
The recipe:
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 10 minutes
Yield: 2 main course servings
Total: 20 minutes
What you’ll need:
1 T olive oil
2 green onions, sliced
1 ½ cup vegetables, finely chopped (broccoli, pepper, carrot, peas, zucchini all work)
½ cup cooked protein, finely chopped (chicken, shrimp, and tofu all work)
2 cups leftover rice, brown or white
2 eggs, whisked
1 t Kosher salt
1 t sesame oil
2 T furikake seasoning or crumbled seaweed snacks or nori sheets
Steps:
- Heat the olive oil over medium high heat in a large sauté pan.
- Add the green onion and vegetables, and briefly stir fry, about 2 minutes.
- Add the protein and rice and stir until heated through, about 2 minutes. The rice should begin to toast.
- Scoot all ingredients to one side of the pan to make room for cooking the eggs. Add the eggs and cook through. Once cooked through, stir into the rest of the ingredients.
- Add the salt, sesame oil and seasoning to the rice, stir to combine.
- Serve warm. Finish with soy sauce and chili crisp, if desired.
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