Nasi Goreng from Indonesia

Rice is one of the staples in SE Asia and I made the famous fried rice (Nasi Goreng) without meat, adapted from We Heart Food's recipe. I did not have all the ingredients listed and so improvised quite a bit. I used my spicy hot sauce instead of sambal, and mixed it with a little bit of maggi oriental sauce (we don't use ketchup). I pressure cooked two cups of rice, just before making this dish. Generally for fried rice, you want the rice grains to not stick, hence cooking the rice the previous day and refrigerating is recommended. However if you add a little lemon juice or oil when cooking the rice, it doesn't get sticky.

So basically it was a lot of cooking on the wok. First heat some peanut oil, add the cubed tofu and cook till the tofu is brown. I also season at every stage of cooking, so the tofu got some salt. Remove it and keep it aside. Then add the chopped scallions, julienned carrots, peas, garlic, red and green bell peppers. Cook till the veggies are soft, add the tofu back, then the sauce mix. Cook for a few more minutes, adjust the spice level and add the cooked rice. Toss till everything is combined well. Beat a couple of eggs, and make a thin omelet on a girdle, cut it into smaller pieces and spread on the fried rice. I used a mixture of cilantro, mint and sweet basil for garnish. The rice was not spicy and went well with the spicy Bicol Express.