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Fried Rice
Boil the rice and cool it in a dish; when it is cold, turn it from the dish, cut it into slices nearly one inch thick, season them with salt and pepper, and then roll them in cornmeal. Have in readiness a frying-kettle half full of smoking-hot fat, and fry the pieces of rice in it until they are of a golden brown. Remove them from the fat with a skimmer, place them on brown paper for a moment to free them from grease, and serve.
Despite the name, this has nothing to do with the wok. It is a set-and-slice preparation in the family of fried cornmeal mush and rice croquettes, served as a starch course or garnish.
- The hinge: cook the rice soft and wetThe slices only hold together if the grains have released enough starch to bind as they cool. Use a medium- or short-grain rice, simmered in plenty of water or milk until quite soft — not fluffy separate long-grain, which will crumble under the knife.
- No quantities are givenAs a guide, 1 cup dry rice cooked in about 3 cups liquid, pressed into a loaf pan, yields roughly eight one-inch slices — enough for four as a side.
- Chill hard, not just coolThe recipe asks only that the rice be cold before slicing. In a modern kitchen that means packing it into a shallow pan or mould and chilling it several hours, ideally overnight; warm rice will slump off the skimmer and break apart in the fat.
- Frying temperature"Smoking-hot fat" was a visual cue from the days of lard and beef drippings, and it overshoots with modern neutral oils. Aim for 350–375°F; hotter than that browns the cornmeal before the interior warms through.
- Cornmeal, not flourPlain yellow or white cornmeal, medium grind, is what gives the crust its grit and colour. Pat the slices dry and press the meal on firmly; a damp surface makes the coating slide off in the kettle.
- Brown paperUnbleached wrapping paper was a common draining surface in kitchens of the period. Paper towels or a wire rack over a sheet pan do the same job; the rack keeps the underside from steaming soft.
- ServingThe book offers no accompaniment. The slices would sit where a potato croquette might, though the recipe itself seasons them only with salt and pepper.
Oscar Tschirky, the maître d'hôtel whose name fronted this 1896 volume, was compiling the working repertoire of a large American hotel kitchen, and this dish belongs to a nineteenth-century habit rather than to any one cuisine: boil a grain to a paste, let it set firm, slice it, and fry it. The same method produced fried cornmeal mush on farmhouse breakfast tables, fried hominy, and Italian fried polenta. The name "fried rice" here carries none of the Chinese-American association it acquired later in the twentieth century, when stir-fried rice dishes spread from restaurant menus into general American use.