Pork Fried Rice

Learn how to make amazing Chinese-style pork fried rice at home.

My ideal fried rice is perfectly al dente with slightly crispy edges, full of rich savory flavors, and loaded with plenty of vegetables, eggs, and whatever protein I can muster up at home. We will use ground pork this time to make a lovely, quick pork stir-fry recipe.

Ingredients for Pork Fried Rice

Rice: Use medium to long-grain rice like Jasmine rice. Jasmine rice cooks up nice and fluffy with a very subtle almost nutty aroma.

Don’t use short grain or glutinous rice. Short grains tend to be too soft, and clumpy and are generally a starchier variety.

Vegetables: Carrots and Green Peas. Carrots and peas bring a much-needed color, texture, flavor, and vitamin boost into our dish.

Minced Pork: use minced pork or roughly chopped pork for the fried rice dish because it’s the most convenient.

Scallions: I think scallions will perfectly round up the triumvirate for excellent fried rice along with rice and eggs. If you don’t like scallions, try chives, leeks, white onions, or yellow onions.

Eggs: Aside from being an important flavor component, eggs also lend additional proteins and various nutrients to the dish.

Vegetable cooking oil: Use a light-tasting salad oil with a high smoke point like sunflower, canola, corn, and rapeseed oils are best but you can also use peanut or avocado oil.

Step by Step

Step 1: Preheat the wok over high heat for about a minute or so. Add the oil and swirl it around until it becomes runny and shows off a nice sheen.

Step 2: Turn down the heat to medium then carefully add in the minced pork. Stir-fry the minced pork for a few minutes. Break up the larger pieces of meat into smaller pieces. Continue to stir-fry until the minced meat is cooked through and some of the edges have turned crispy and golden brown. The fat will render and we’ll use that extra fat for our fried rice. No need to strain it.

Step 3: Add half a tablespoon of soy sauce and a quarter teaspoon of dark soy sauce to deglaze the pan.

Step 4: Add the cooked rice and mix well. Break up large clumps of rice to separate the grains. Make sure to coat the rice in all that lovely pork fat and oil.

Step 5: Turn the heat back on high. Stir-fry the rice and pork together until the rice grains are thoroughly separated. Let the rice rest between tossing and stirring. This way you can let your arms rest and the rice at the bottom of the pan crisps up a bit.

Step 6: Beat two eggs. Move all the ingredients to the outer rim of the wok creating a center. Add in the two tablespoons of oil and once hot, pour the eggs in the center. Let it sit before lightly scrambling it for about two minutes. Gently stir the eggs until they are almost cooked through but still a little wet.

Cook until the rice is well combined with the eggs.

Step 7: Add the blanched carrots and peas. Stir-fry and toss everything together for two minutes. Add a half tablespoon of light soy sauce, a half teaspoon of salt, and a few generous dashes of black pepper powder, then stir-fry again, religiously. Toss and fry everything swiftly around the wok until the rice is well-coated in the additional seasonings. You can add more oil if the rice begins to stick to the wok. Check the seasoning of the fried rice at this point. If you think it needs a little bit more soy sauce or salt, add some more.

Step 8: Generously sprinkle with green onions. Reduce heat if the rice begins to scorch. Give it another good toss. Ready to serve!

Tips for Making the Best-Ever-Fried-Rice

Making fried rice is easy, but getting it right does take a little know-how. Here are some important tips I’ve learned over the years.

1. Use cold, day-old rice

Did you know that the best kind of rice for any fried rice dish is day-old, leftover cold rice? It’s best to cook rice a day ahead. The rice grains will firm up nicely in the fridge making them less likely to stick together and become soggy when cooking.

The grains will also dry up over time which will make it easier to separate and avoid clumpy rice.

Rice can certainly be cooked the same day and then tweaked for cooking fried rice. Air it out for about an hour then pop it in the fridge for a few hours before cooking.

2. Use less water when cooking rice for fried rice

When making rice for any fried rice recipe, use less water to keep it on the dry side. This is crucial to any fried rice dish because the last thing we want our fried rice to be is mushy.  If you put in the right amount of water or worse, put in more water, there’s a risk of the rice becoming marshy and sticky.

3. Preheat your wok and cook using high heat

The next tip is to make sure that you have a hot wok before cooking so before anything else, preheat your wok.

A hot wok over high heat will help fry and turn the rice into a beautiful golden brown color. The heat will cook the rice to achieve those crispy gold edges rather than “steam” the rice turning it mushy.

4. Oil is needed in fried rice

Aside from making sure the oil is hot before cooking fried rice, fried rice requires a pretty good amount of oil.

We need the right amount of oil to coat as much of the rice grains as possible to achieve a good texture. But not too much that it will make our dish too greasy. Oil will also ensure the ingredients don’t stick to the surface of the wok. Don’t worry about the added calories from the oil because it’s a must to prevent mushy, clumpy, and even burnt rice.

5.Use a large enough Wok

Use a sizeable wok so the ingredients don’t get overcrowded when cooking. Toppings may end up spilling over the pan when being tossed around if it’s too small.

I get a good arm workout from all the tossing and mixing. All that stir-frying happening in a small pan can be challenging and messy.

Aside from being hard to mix, if you have too many ingredients in a small pan, the wok won’t be able to heat the ingredients enough causing them to get soggy. When this happens, rice may clump together.

Side tip: You can cook each ingredient individually starting with the raw vegetables then the meats, and lastly, the egg. Then you can return all the ingredients to the pan at the end for the final mixing and seasoning.

Just remember, when making fried rice consider that you need to reduce moisture to stir-fry the rice and ingredients well. Strain and drain your ingredients of oil and moisture. Lest your fried rice will turn into mush.