Post Vals Fried Rice with Chili Crisp

WhenI returned to NYC from the Swiss hotel gig with bland food (see track 8), I was so desperate for spice that I would put my luggage down and immediately order $100 worth of Sichuan food. In my bachelor days, I would order 5 or 6 Chinese takeout dishes just for myself and call it “grocery shopping.” The cashier would ask, “How many chopsticks? Four? Five?” “Uhh…four will be fine,” I’d reply sheepishly.

Afew years ago, my friend Joe Ancowitz, a fantastic trumpet player, vocalist, and amazing cook, introduced me to his version of chili crisp, a spicy, crunchy condiment based on the recipe from Mission Chinese, a hipster Sichuan spot in Manhattan Chinatown. I began to make my own version of chili crisp and word spread among friends. During the early days of Covid, we had a steady stream of musicians arriving at our place for stoop-side crisp pickup. One friend requested it in the form of an IV drip. I loved hearing about everyone’s applications: pizza, grilled cheese, latkes, leg of lamb.

With the kitchen right next to the piano, the sizzling of fried rice became a frequent underscoring to my composing. When I listen back to my voice memos, it sounds like a cymbal with rivets. We cook so much Chinese food in our house that there is always leftover rice in the fridge. Risha showed me how to make a proper fried rice:

Ingredients

Day old rice

Salt

Canola oil Eggs, beaten Scallions

Heat a wok on high and add cooking oil. Break up the leftover rice with your fingers and add to wok, seasoning with salt. Stir fry until hot and a bit crispy and then add leftovers you want to use up. You can beat a few eggs, quickly stir fry, and transfer to a bowl before adding rice. After the rice is done, add in the lightly cooked eggs. Garnish with scallions. Load fried rice with chili crisp.

Ingredients

4 cups neutral cooking oil such as canola

½ cup sesame oil

4 cups of chilies (such as Sichuan

Facing Heaven or er jing tiao or Mexican Arból or Pasilla)

10 cloves garlic, roughly chopped

3 inch piece ginger, peeled and roughly chopped

2-3 tbsp Sichuan peppercorns

2 cinnamon sticks

Handful of star anise pods

2 cardamom pods, crushed

2 teaspoons fennel seeds

2 teaspoons cumin seeds

2 teaspoons sesame seeds

Large handful of peanuts

10 shallots, sliced

5 cloves garlic, sliced

1 tbsp fermented black beans

2 teaspoons fish sauce

First, put on your hazmat suit and open windows. In a large heatproof bowl or pot, combine chilies, chopped garlic, ginger, Sichuan peppercorns, cinnamon sticks, star anise, cardamom, fennel seed, cumin seed, sesame seeds, and peanuts. Heat the canola and sesame oil over high heat in a separate pot. Add shallots to the oil to fry. When they are about 5 minutes from being brown and crispy, add the sliced garlic. Remove shallots and garlic with a slotted spoon and drain on a paper towel, salting lightly.

Return the oil to a high flame and when the temperature reaches 375 degrees, carefully pour oil over the chili mixture and whisk. At this point your apartment will magically turn into a Sichuan restaurant and the aroma will linger for days. When cool enough to handle, strain the solids, reserving the chili oil, and discard the cinnamon sticks and star anise (good luck finding those!). Pulse the solids in a food processor till about the size of red pepper flakes.

Remove to a bowl and add in reserved fried shallots and garlic, fish sauce, and the black beans. Store in jars in the fridge for months. You can use the byproduct chili oil in many other dishes like ma po tofu, dan dan noodles, and my Solo Late Night Noodles from track 9!

Drink pairing

This is an oddly specific one but the combo of fried rice/crisp and Apricot La Croix is genius. Get that pamplemousse outta here. It’s apricot or bust.

Danny—piano

Trio food memory: cooking and rehearsing at an Ohio rental cabin with the romantic name “Honey Bear Hideaway.”

Nostalgic childhood dish: Fettuccine Alfredo

Guilty pleasure: Cool Ranch Doritos, unreasonable amounts of mayonnaise

Favorite dish to cook: Sichuanese fish fragrant eggplant

Recent cooking soundtrack: Dolly Parton Coat of Many Colors

Food aversion: Otis Spunkmeyer muffins

Favorite dessert: Blueberry Pie, anything combining chocolate and peanut butter

Comfort food: My mom’s chicken soup

Dish you want to learn to make: Soup dumplings, cassoulet

Chris—bass

Trio food memory: Treating ourselves to a blowout seafood meal in Boston after the weirdest wedding gig of our lives.

Guilty pleasure: straight Nutella from the jar

Favorite dish to cook: Spaghetti with meat sauce

Recent cooking soundtrack: Benjamin Britten Our Hunting Fathers

Nostalgia childhood dish: fresh blackberries from the backyard with milk and sugar

Food aversion: brussels sprouts

Favorite dessert: strawberry rhubarb tart

Comfort food: chicken tikka masala from Kanan Restaurant in Brooklyn

Dish I’d like to learn to make: ratatouille

Max—drums

Trio food memory: S’mores at our first band retreat. Also the shock at how much salt Danny put in the pasta water. I believe dinner was an amazing grilled jumbo shrimp and pasta.

Nostalgic childhood dish: chicken and stuffing casserole

Guilty pleasure: chicken sub from Subway

Favorite dish to cook: NY Times fried fish tacos

Recent cooking soundtrack: Joey Baron Just Listen

Food aversion: hard boiled eggs

Favorite dessert: frozen yogurt

Comfort food: cumin lamb noodles from Xian Famous Foods

Dish you want to learn to make: my grandmother’s kreplach soup