Healthy Fried Rice

Normally, the worlds "healthy" and "fried rice" don't bond very well.

But today, thanks to my son Josh, I'd like to share his favorite recipe for fried rice that's about as healthy as you're going to find.

Josh's Healthy Fried Rice

1/2 or 1 cup of uncooked white rice
2 1/2 cups grated cabbage, grated into ribbons
Two eggs
1 medium zucchini, sliced into strips
1/2 onion of your choice, sliced
Soy sauce
Bay leaf
Butter
Salt and pepper to taste

Cook the rice, adding a little olive oil and a bay leaf for flavor. Let sit until ready.

Fire up your wok to the medium setting on your stove and add butter to coat it. When the butter's popping, add onion and zucchini. Let cook for five minutes or so, then stir, then let sit again so it can steam and get nice and soft.

When the onion is clearly cooked, drop two eggs in a separate pan like you're making an omelete or scrambled eggs. When they're done, cut up the egg in small pieces and add to the vegetables, stirring well.

Make a bed of veggies and egg and then add the rice over it. Immediately season with soy sauce -- we do five or six passes with the bottle. You want the the rice to be dark, looking like proper fried rice.

Stir the rice vigorously; this should take no more than two minutes. If you keep it in there too long, the rice will burn into the wok -- this is why the rice goes on top of the veggies.

Season to taste and remove all and place in a bowl. It's delicious already, but the secret ingredient is still to come!

Add more butter to the wok and drop in the sliced cabbage. Let it sit for a bit, then stir well, watching for it to be cooked and soft. Add two or three passes with the bottle of soy sauce, stirring well.

When it looks done, add to the rice and veggies, being sure not to dump all of it in -- just the cabbage, not the excess soy sauce and sludge.

Folks, if this isn't one of the best fried rice recipes this side of the Orient, I don't know what is.

Chet Day'
Editor, The Health Circus
http://chetday.com