[Recipe]: Chilli Cheese Stir-fried Rice.

Whilst sitting in a cafe yesterday I came to the realisation that I never begin my blog posts with a simple greeting. I promise you I am not impolite or inconsiderate to others. So, much overdue… Hello everyone! Hope you are all well and looking forward to New Year’s eve tomorrow. Before the ever so common healthy eating, diet and exercise new year’s resolutions come into full swing I have a filling naughty recipe for you. Prewarning: if you are a whimp when it comes to spicy foods, maybe you’d better just continue with opting for some Kraft Maccaroni & Cheese. This is one of those unintentional, experimental recipes which came about yesterday when I was craving spicy fried rice. I have made chicken and a meat free versions of this; both equally being tasty so feel free to adapt this recipe according to your dietary requirements.
Ingredients (serves 2):

• Steamed or boiled plain white rice.
• Chicken breast (optional).
• 1 green chilli.
• Gochujang or another type of chilli paste.
• Quarter of a savoy cabbage.
• Kimchi (optional).
• 1 clove of garlic.
• Half of a white onion.
• Salt and black pepper.
• Vegetable stock powder.
• Water.
• Grated chedda/cheese slices usually used for burgers.

Recipe:

1. Boil or steam the rice in a saucepan or a rice cooker.
2. If you desire to add protein ingredients to the dish, they should be placed in the frying pan first of all with a drizzle of olive oil. If you want to make this a meat free, skip ahead to step 3.
3. Finely chop the garlic clove along with the green chilli. You can deseed the chilli; this depends on your preference.
4. Ensure there are no pink parts to the chunks of chicken (-if you added this) before combining the chilli and garlic. Reduce the heat.
5. Roughly chop half a white onion and add it to the chicken and/or garlic and green chilli. Stir well.
6. Sprinkle some salt, pepper and vegetable stock powder to taste. Stir well once again.
7. Directly after seasoning the chicken and/or onion, garlic and green chilli add half a cup of warm/hot water to the same frying pan; followed by a tablespoon of chilli paste. Stir until the sauce you have created coats all of the ingredients. If you are concerned about the dish being too spicy include some tomato ketchup.
8. Chop the savoy cabbage quarter, and enter it into the frying pan: this will wilt quickly. If you are using kimchi now is the time to put it into the pan.
9. Leave to simmer for 10 minutes, stirring at 5 minute intervals to avoid the ingredients from sticking to the frying pan.
10. At this point in time the rice should be fully cooked with a fluffy texture. Add two cup of the rice to the frying pan containing the other ingredients.
11. Over a medium heat, stir fry the ingredients until most or all of the liquid has been absorbed by the rice.
12. As the rice becomes drier use the last few minutes of the cooking duration to melt either cheese slices or grated cheddar cheese into the rice. Turn the rice over several times with an appropriate cooking utensil to evenly disrupted the melted cheese.

Serving suggestion: garnish with chopped spring onions and toasted sesame seeds.

If you want to bulk out the rice further, Spam, rice cake and not fully softened sweet potatoes all accompany well.