Lemon stir fry rice
A tasty, lemon stir fry rice recipe that is healthy, and simple for a busy cook.
This recipe starts with cooked and chilled brown rice. I choose to cook rice in a pressure cooker for reasons of efficiency and speed. 2 cups of brown rice 6 cups of water and cook at pressure for 20minutes. I do this in bulk for reasons described later.
Preferably, transfer the hot rice to a clean storage container and put the lid on while hot. This heat sterilized both the container and the lid.
Dingo trick. Waiting for a pressure cooker to decompress is a pain in the b..m or the b..t depending on what side of the big ditch you’re on. So, if it is an old fashioned non-electric one like mine, lowering the cooker into some cool water can make the decompression very quick. The cooker can be removed as soon as the safety lock button drops down and the content will still be hot.
Brown rice is already a healthy choice for stir-fries. It has more fibre and resistant starch. It can be used immediately. However, if cooked in bulk and chilled it is very efficient for the busy cook to prepare multiple meals.
Nutritional benefits of chilling cooked carbohydrate
As well as being efficient for meal preparation chilling of cooked carbohydrate substantially lowers the GI (glycemic index). Lowering the GI results in a less sharp peak in blood glucose after eating and more sustained energy availability for a longer time for living life.
This is mediated by the cooling process increasing ‘resistant starch’ up to 2.5 times. This can slow the digestion of the starch in the intestines so that more of it is digested in the large intestine where beneficial fatty acids are produced. ” My typo nearly called them farty acids, maybe that is another truth.” Anyway, there is growing evidence for a long list of possible health benefits of this cascade of events:
- Lower blood glucose spikes,
- Improved insulin sensitivity
- Increased satiety or feeling of hunger when reducing food intake,
- Less weight gain,
- Better gut bacteria to make healthy fatty acids,
- Less colon cancer and inflammatory bowel disease,
- Less inflammatory disorders,
- More farting?
These benefits persist even when the food is reheated, so this is very good news if you wish to use a batch of cooked rice to easily prepare multiple meals.
Health benefits of cooling cooked starch
The evidence for the resistant starch causing farting is rather thin, that excuse has lost some traction. But I can still blame the fibre content of the brown rice!
Lemon rice recipe
- Cut up a large onion and stir-fry in a little olive oil,
- Add cooked (and preferably chilled) brown rice (a serve for 3 people) and continue to stir-fry,
- Prepare the lemons sauce with the juice of a medium lemon and the finely chopped rind, 2 teaspoons of sugar, a grind of pepper, and a teaspoon of plain flour (or cornflour for gluten-free),
- When the rice and onion are cooked to your satisfaction, turn off the heat and pour in the lemon sauce and immediately stir it in to finish its cooking while resting before serving.
Goes well with grilled fish.
Tim
If you like this recipe you may like my collection of Other food ideas and Wanderers wild seafood ideas.
