a picture of a bowl of kimchi fried rice sitting on a wooden table top

Emily Cuddeford & Rachel Morgan: Kimchi Fried Rice

This recipe is from the book Kitchen Table: Simple Things Made Well by Emily Cuddeford and Rachel Morgan

Emily: We served this on our brunch menu at Kitchen Table, but actually my favourite time and way to eat this is as a simple and comforting dinner, piled into a bowl, while I’m curled up on the sofa with dogs and blankets all tucked about me.

The combination of sticky rice, jammy rich egg yolk and hot and sour kimchi is all I need for a quick and satisfying dinner. You get bags of flavour into this dish with very little time or effort, due largely to the kimchi and all its funky fermenting joyfulness. If you ever have leftover rice, or indeed are cooking rice, cook a little extra so you have some ready for this – it makes a fast meal even quicker.

Order Kitchen Table: Simple Things Made Well (HarperCollins, £25) here

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Method

1 Prepare the sushi rice. You can either follow the packet instructions or use the method I find best, which is this.

Put the rice into a bowl and cover with cold water. Use your hand to shoogle it around – you will notice that the water starts to become milky. This is the starch coming out. Drain the rice through a sieve and repeat this three times. Once I have finished rinsing it, I soak it in a bowl of fresh cold water for around 10 minutes. To cook the rice, I drain it again, making sure to shake out as much water as possible, then put it into a pan with an equal amount of cold water (in this case 400g) and a good pinch of salt, and put the lid on. Bring to the boil, and as soon as you start to see steam coming from the pan, turn it down to the lowest heat and simmer for 10 minutes. After the time is up, turn the heat off but leave the lid on for it to steam for a further 10 minutes. This should give you cooked and sticky rice but not mushy or gummy and overcooked. There should also be no liquid left.

2 Put 1 tablespoon of olive oil into a large wok or frying pan and heat. Peel and finely slice the garlic and add to the oil, cooking until it starts to colour and turns a light golden colour. Roughly chop the kimchi and add this to the pan, cooking for a few minutes to cook off any excess liquid and heat through. Then add the gochujang and stir until it’s evenly dispersed. Add the rice and break it up, stirring until it has all become a fiery orange from the gochujang. Taste and season, adding salt if needed. Turn off the heat and stir in the sesame oil.

3 Heat the other tablespoon of olive oil in a frying pan until hot, then crack in the eggs, season with salt and pepper and cook to your liking. I leave these with a very runny yolk but a crispy, lacy white skirt around them.

4 Spoon the rice into bowls and top with an egg and a sprinkle of either black or white sesame seeds, toasted for extra flavour.

NOTES
If you want, you can add extra greens to this by slicing some spring greens or cabbage and adding them with the kimchi. You can also top with fresh spring onions for an extra bite. If you want a meaty version, frying diced smoked bacon with the garlic makes this a great brunch addition.