Food - Drink
How A Dash Of Cornstarch Can Improve Fried Rice
By CYRENA GOURDEAU
Making the perfect fried rice may seem simple, but messing it up can be just as easy as doing it right. Pro chef and writer J. Kenji López-Alt has one easy trick up his sleeve for making great fried rice, and all you need is an ingredient you probably already have: cornstarch.
Cornstarch has many uses in Chinese cuisine, including coating ingredients for frying and thickening stir-fry sauces. López-Alt gets more creative and sprinkles cornstarch over leftover, dry rice before frying it in a wok, and he says that this secret ingredient will “help you break up the individual grains.”
López-Alt also uses the back of a spatula to break up the rice as it cooks, and recommends cooking the rice in multiple batches for those of us with less powerful burners on our stoves. With all these tips combined, you can make perfectly fluffy fried rice that doesn't clump together into a sticky mess.