Have a really great dish to serve and yet don’t want to leave it too boring with plain white rice? Or even if plain white rice is all that you need but you’re thinking of spicing it up just a tiny bit anyway? That sort of thinking always leads you to trod down another path, to veer off the main motorway. I really wanted to make something new and pretty unique so I had a little look online, just to make sure my idea was kinda like ‘oh-I’m-such-a-genius-cool’. But sometimes that path (which I was chatting on about earlier) is pretty well-trodden since loads of people might have done it before you. (I look on enviously when others make these amazing things like Jasmine Tea Rice and Green Tea Broth,etc.) So what happened was I told myself to shut my jealous trap and just try this. It never hurt anyone to trod down a paved out pathway anyway so really, what was I on about?

Really. The stress of my exams which begin on Monday is getting to me.

My Mum used to mix a raw egg into hot steamed rice for added flavour to serve with the spread of Chinese dishes she made. The egg just mixes in once you break the yoke, slowly cooking as you go and the smell that wafts up as you mix the rice is simply gorgeous. When she goes Japanese, she makes sure to flavour the rice with black sesames or something else that’s pretty damn good too. I’m a plain white rice girl that needs her rice cooked just al dente. Not too soft and yet not too hard and dry. Mostly because I love saving this gorgeous naked rice for soaking up all the gravy off the plates of oriental glory or I dunk them (this gets very messy and my parents hate it when I do this because I just look like a right twat and nothing like the elegant eater I usually am — which they have spent ages training their daughters to be) in soup and slurp it all up. I love the smell of cooked rice but there’s also nothing quite like the smell of flavoured rice or rice fried with loads of other goodies.

For a quick lunch, I never think to have rice because it feels wrong to not pair rice with a hearty dish. And that would be too heavy a meal for the day. An onigiri or temarizushi would be a good idea too but I’ll save that for some cool Japanese guy to prepare it for me someday. On the other hand, plain white rice with a fried egg also seems pretty sad to me. So this was a great recipe to have around and it takes less than 20minutes to prepare. Woop for joy, guys. This recipe gives you a very fragrant and lightly flavoured rice that borders on the sweet side of things and the almonds give it another dimension of nuttiness and near buttery taste. It’s so light and yet is flavourful enough to have on its own. I paired this with a fried egg for greater ease in preparation and simply because I’m saving my awesome Wild Alaskan salmon steaks (which BLIMEY, cost me a fortune and are right now, sitting quietly in the freezer like good dogs) for an awesome meal I’ve got all planned out.

This recipe has been inspired by one I found on the net. It doesn’t use green tea sprinkles or nuts but I thought the addition would make it more flavourful. For a prettier bowl of rice, Mum likes to add shredded seaweed and sesame seeds. It’s definitely a good touch. I’ve served this pretty much naked with almonds as the golden touch and cooking sprinkles to deepen the green tea flavour.

This post has been entered into Skinny Gourmet’s Tea Party food event. The deadline is 25 May 08 and the roundup will be one I’ll be looking forward to!

Here is my version of chameshi. For more information on traditional flavoured rice in Japan, click here. This makes 2 servings of green tea laced sweet rice and will go very well with marinated fish or seafood in my opinion.

Green Tea Rice (chameshi) with Almonds
Ingredients

1/2 cup white rice (I’ve used basmati)
300ml brewed sencha
1 tbs rice vinegar
1 tbs sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp green tea cooking sprinkles
4 tbs of chopped toasted almonds

Rice and tea go in the pan to boil. After it reaches the boil, lower heat and let it simmer till all the water is absorbed. Then add the vinegar, sugar and salt. Stir well. Add the green tea sprinkles and chopped toasted almonds, mixing to coat all the rice nicely with the green tea.
Garnish with whatever comes to mind and serve with your choice of meats or vegetables.

Itadakimasu!