La petite biscotte Now in Munich…

Bento n°5: Fried Rice & Mini Corn Cakes

Contents

• Fried rice (scroll down for recipe)
• Corn cakes (scroll down for recipe)
• Baby spinach salad with ricotta
• California roll
• Cherry tomatoes
• Little bottle of vinaigrette for the salad

What I liked about this bento

This bento allowed me to use up an incredible amount of leftovers. Over the past days I had gathered up leftovers of: ham, steamed carrots, cooked corn, rice and ricotta. It was really fun to turn those leftovers into a yummy meal. I particularly liked the fried rice, which is an awesome dish: Takes about 10 minutes to throw together, can use up almost any leftover vegetables and can be made with any sort of rice or any sort of canned/frozen vegetables.
I also liked the balance between vegetables and the rest in this bento.

What I didn’t like about this bento

The corn cakes: Were adapted from a recipe of Tim Mälzer. I liked the taste but the original recipe suggested way too much garlic for my taste. I’m going to reduce the amount considerably next time and I’m going to drop a little spoon of ricotta in the middle to soften the flavour a little, which brings us to the next point.
The ricotta on the baby spinach: Didn’t like. I ended up putting the ricotta on the corn cakes instead. The spinach leaves tasted great with the vinaigrette alone and really didn’t need the additional cheese.
Also this bento is not really made to be kept a long time before eating. We ate it about half an hour after preparation and I wouldn’t suggest eating it much later than that without fridge because the ricotta doesn’t really preserve well at room temperature. Also it’s nice if the fried rice can be heated up in the micro wave before eating as it’s best eaten hot.

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Fried Rice

Ingredients

• 1 cup of cooked rice (leftover rice works really well, I used Japonica rice)
• 1 egg
• 90g of finely diced ham or diced cooked chicken
• 100g of frozen or canned peas
• 1 carrot, cut in small pieces
• 1/2 onion, finely chopped
• 1 tsp chicken stock powder
• 1 Tbsp soy sauce
• vegetable oil

Preparation

1. Put the egg in a little bowl and stirr it a little with a fork to break the egg yolks and to mix them with the egg whites.
2. Heat the vegetable oil in a wok or a large pan.
3. Turn the heat to medium-low and add the eggs. Scramble it just like you would for scrambled eggs. When they are cooked (be careful not to burn them), remove them on a plate and add a little more vegetable oil to the wok.
4. Turn the heat to medium and add the onions. Cook them a little until transparent and add the carrots. Cook them for 3-4 minutes while stirring occasionally. Add the peas and continue cooking everything for 4 more minutes. Once the peas and carrots are almost soft, add the diced ham. Cook while stirring frequently for about 2 minutes (or until the peas and carrots are soft).
5. Sprinkle the stock powder over the vegetables/ham, turn the heat up to medium-high and add the rice. Incorporate the vegetables well with the rice and stir continuously while you fry the rice 2-3 minutes.
6. Add the soy sauce and the egg, mix well and remove from heat.
7. Serves 2 bento portions, enjoy.

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Corn Cakes (adapted from Essen & Trinken für jeden Tag, issue 10)

Ingredients

• 1/2 clove of garlic, finely chopped
• 2 eggs
• 70 ml milk
• 50g flour
• salt
• chilli powder
• 1 tsp dried thyme
• 70g canned corn, drained
• 2 Tbsp of olive oil

Preparation

• In a medium bowl, mix the garlic, the eggs and the milk. Add the flour slowly and incorporate well. Mix in the salt, the chilli powder and the thyme. Now fold in the corn.
• Heat up the vegetable oil in a medium sized pan. When it’s hot, turn the heat to medium and drop spoonfuls of the corn batter into the pan. Cook until golden brown from both sides and remove on a plate layered with paper towel. Continue until you use up all the batter. Sprinkle with chopped chives. Makes about 12 little cakes.
• Tip: If your cakes turn out to be shaped weirdly when you cook them in the pan, simply drop half of the mixture in the pan at once (just like a pancake) and cook it until golden brown. Once done, take a little glass and cut out little circles.