Schezwan fried rice recipe with step by step photos –Â spicy and tasty Indo Chinese recipe of stir-fried vegetables and rice in schezwan sauce.
If you crave for something spicy for lunch or dinner, then this schezwan fried rice recipe is really a very good option. Its easy to prepare if you have schezwan sauce ready with you.
Chopping the veggies does take some time. However, modern gadgets like an electric chopper or food processor makes the work easy. I always prefer to chop the veggies on my own.
Tips for making schezwan fried rice
- The key to a good stir-fried dish be it rice or noodles, is the smoky flavor that you get in the dish. Now this is achieved by stir-frying at very high heat. When I make these stir-fried rice or noodles, I keep the gas flame to the highest. There has to be continuous stirring happening in the wok. Keep all your sauces and seasonings ready. You cannot take your own time to open the soy sauce bottle’s lid or open the jar of salt or pepper or chop the celery. Just prep everything and keep near your work space. its always better to use a pan or wok with handles as you have to frequently stir and toss.
- Another key point is to steam the rice and let it cool completely. The rice has to be cooked al dente, meaning just about cooked. In this post I have given the step by step method of cooking the rice. This technique can be implemented if you want to cook rice for any stir-fried dish.
- The veggies can be shredded or julienned or chopped finely.
- I had already made the Schezwan sauce a day before. You can use make your own sauce or add a store brought one. The amount of schezwan sauce to be added depends on the spice level in the sauce and your taste buds. So please add as per your own taste. I usually keep the schezwan fried rice less spiced than what is served outside in the Indo Chinese food stalls and restaurants.
Schezwan fried rice can be served with recipes like veg manchurian or mushroom manchurian or paneer manchurian or any sauce based dish.
It also tastes good on its own. I served schezwan fried rice with kale & mushrooms in ginger sauce.
How to make schezwan fried rice
Cooking rice
1. Rinse the basmati rice, till the water runs clear of the starch. Then soak the rice in water for 30 mins. Drain and keep aside.
2. Bring water, salt and a few drops of oil to a gentle boil.
3. Add the drained soaked rice.
4. Simmer on a low flame, till the rice grains are just cooked.
5. Strain the rice in a colander. Rinse the rice with water so that the rice grains stop cooking. Gently with your hands, move the cooked rice grains, while rinsing them with water. Drain completely. Cover and keep aside.
6. Chop all the vegetables finely. Remember to chop the french beans very finely. They take more time to cook than other veggies. You can also blanch them first and then cook. Another option is to add the beans first and then add the other vegetables.
Making schezwan fried rice
7. Heat oil in a pan. Add the chopped garlic and saute for about 15 to 20 seconds.
8. Now increase the flame to its highest, add all the vegetables including the spring onions and celery.
9. Keep on stirring the veggies, till they start getting browned from the edges. It took me about 9 minutes for the vegetables to cook.
10. Now add the schezwan sauce.
11. Stir well.
12. Add the rice in parts and keep on stirring. Stir gently as you don’t want the rice grains to break.
13. Season with salt, pepper and vinegar.
14. Mix and stir fry for 2 to 3 minutes tossing the rice so that the sauce coats each and every rice grain well. Check the taste and add more salt, pepper and schezwan sauce if required.
15. Garnish with spring onion greens and Serve the schezwan fried rice hot with any Indo Chinese sauce like mushroom manchurian or gobi manchurian.
More rice recipes
Schezwan Fried Rice
Ingredients
for cooking rice
- 1.5 cups basmati rice or long grained rice
- 6 cups water
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 to 3 drops of oil
for making schezwan fried rice
- 2 or 2.5 cups finally chopped vegetables (i used - 1 medium carrot, 8 french beans, ¼ cup finally chopped cabbage, 1 small capsicum/green bell pepper)
- 1 or 2 spring onions (scallions) - finely chopped - reserve the greens for garnishing
- 1 teaspoon finely chopped celery (optional) - skip if you do not have.
- 2 to 3 garlic, finely chopped
- 2 tablespoon schezwan sauce or as required
- ¼ teaspoon crushed black pepper or as required
- ½ teaspoon rice vinegar or apple cider vinegar or regular vinegar
- 2 tablespoon sesame oil or any vegetable oil
- salt as required
Instructions
cooking rice
- Rinse rice very well till the water runs clear of starch. Soak the rice in enough water for 30 minutes.
- Drain and keep aside.
- In a pot, bring to a gentle boil 6 cups of water with salt and 2 to 3 drops of oil.
- Add the soaked and drained rice to the hot water.
- On a low to medium flame cook the rice without the lid.
- When the rice becomes al dente or just cooked, remove the pot from fire and strain the rice.
- Gently rinse the rice in water so that they stop cooking and don't stick to each other.
- Cover the rice and keep aside.
making schezwan fried rice
- Finely chop all the vegetables. You can even shred the vegetables in a food processor.
- Heat oil in a wok. Add garlic and saute for a 15 to 20 seconds.
- Add the onions, celery and all the vegetables.
- Increase the flame and stir fry the vegetables on a high heat.
- More finely the vegetables are chopped, more faster they will cook.
- Keep on stirring and tossing the vegetables on a high heat continuously. So that they are equally browned and cooked.
- When the edges of the veggies starts to become light brown, add schezwan sauce.
- Stir and then add the drained rice in parts. Mix and toss the rice with the veggies gently.
- Season with salt, pepper and vinegar. Stir and toss well so that the sauce coats all the rice grains evenly.
- Garnish with the spring onions greens.
- Serve schezwan fried rice plain or with a side indo chinese dish like veg manchurian, mushroom manchurian or any dish of your choice.
Hi,plan to make this. Where can I buy Sichuan peppercorns? The ones available on Amazon have v bad reviews. Also, will skipping them make a big difference in the taste? Thanks and Regards!
i have not added sichuan pepper in this schezwan fried rice recipe. if you are referring to schezwan sauce recipe posted on the blog, then you can skip them. the pungent and heady aroma will be missing, but the schezwan sauce will still taste good. both garlic and red chillies give a good taste. you can add 1 small finely chopped tomato or puree if you want.
when we used to live in goa, i would buy them at the local market. they use to be fresh green ones, which i would dry at home. whenever anyone goes to goa, i ask them to get a small batch of sichuan peppercorns. if the reviews are not good, then better not to buy them.
Very nice Chinese schezwan fried rice
thanks for the review and rating on schezwan fried rice.
SEEMS VERY TASTY. WAITING FOR A CHANCE TO COOK AND TASTE.
HOW DO U MAKE SCHEZWAN SAUCE??
thanks amar. i have shared the recipe of schezwan sauce recipe. kindly use the search button to get the recipe.
Hi! I’ve been a huge fan of your recipes ever since I discovered it about 4 years ago! I trust your recipes so much that I’m not even scared to try out something for the very first time, following your instructions :). I’m planning to try this fried rice recipe soon. Just one question- is basmati rice the best for this recipe, or would even jeera samba rice be good enough? I have tried my own fried rice recipes with the latter, and that also gives a nice flavour, which is why I’m asking. Do let me know. Thank you ????!
thank you ambika for this lovely feedback. for the schezwan fried rice, basmati rice works well. even you can make with jeera samba rice. i have also made pulao, other variety of fried rice and biryani with jeera samba and always loved the results. welcome and happy cooking.
Thank you so much for sharing this recipe. Schezwan rice served by the Chinese food outlets and restaurants is a little different in appearance.Their rice grains are so orange in color. Do they add other seasonings and food color too? Thanks.
welcome sneha. they use color and thats why the rice grains have a deep orange color.
Tried this recipe, it came out great. Over the years I had many Chinese Recipe disasters. But with this recipe ( & the Manchurian veggie) I was able to break that streak. Thanks !
welcome deepa 🙂 thanks for positive views. glad you finally you got the veg schezwan fried rice recipe right.
Dear Ma’am, Thankyou so so much for the recipe. It was outstanding and very tasty. This is the reason why I actually love your site. It always offers the best and mouth-watering recipe. Again, thankyou so much.
welcome always mahima 🙂 thanks for encouraging words and positive views.
Hi I just had a bad day at cooking and spoilt the dish by adding too much salt, I thought I could use the traditional hack for this and add a little bit of lemon to neutralize it although I know Lemons are never a part of fried rice. Now the problem is the rice is tasting too lemony, is there anything I can do to save my hard work?
hmmm. some more schezwan sauce or red chilli paste can balance the sourness of lemons. cooking disasters happen. with me too they happen especially while baking 🙂
Very nice & Very delicious recepi .thanku for share thish recepi
welcome deepa 🙂 thanks for positive feedback.
The other day I tried three of your dishes, schezwan rice, schezwan noodles and paneer chilli gravy for dinner. All three turned out superb!My family loved them all. Thanks alot 🙂
glad to know this swapnil, thank you for your kind words and positive feedback. you are welcome.
Tried it today.. yet to taste.. i made with the sauce available in market. Colour is not as in pictures here.. Probably the sauce from the market is not as colorful as homemade.. thank you fr the recipe..
welcome sandhya. the color depends on the red chilies used. the sauce from the market does not give a deep red color.
Made d rice very awsum………… ???????????????????✊
thanks ritika
Tried it using the chings schezuan sauce, the rice was fantastic..! Hubby n me both Loved it thank you
welcome nikita. glad to know this.
tried it earlier this morning for husband’s lunch box. After tasting a spoonful, we ended up having some of it for breakfast too 😉 haha. Thank you for the recipe,! It’s bookmarked.
welcome komal. thanks for sharing your positive feedback.
Hi dasana
I bought schhezwan sauce of Fun food brand ..but the ingredients says tomato paste ,so can I use this still for rice.
Because u r sauce recipe has chilli. Getting confused!!
Please help me.
hema, yes you can use. some recipes of schezwan sauce has tomato sauce/tomato ketchup as a ingredient. i have not added as it makes the sauce slightly sweet.
Ma’am please sharing the good stuff
This recipie turned out to be mind blowing thnx for such a wonderful presentation all ur recipies are superb ma’am.
welcome riya. thanks for sharing positive feedback on recipes.
Can I use ready made schezwan sauce.
riya, yes you can. or you can make sauce at home.
May I use other sauce like soya,chilli
aishwarya, yes you can.
can we prepare the sauce in the house itself
priya, yes we can.
simply superb…. it really worked out because in my house people like spicy stuff, this was spicy ….
thanks priya. good to know this.
Thxs for yr lovely recipe
My kids loved schezwan fried rice
welcome jigisha. glad to know this.
i tried this recipe and it comes too good. Thanks for your great recipes
welcome kamal
very nice
Hey dasanna ,
I made some of your recipes m really my husband enjoyed eating them as he is fond of varieties of food. Also I like the method of explaining recipes into easy steps.
Thnx n Regards
welcome shailaja. glad to know this.
Nice Dear
thanks asha
Hey dasanna,
I tried your schezwan rice, paneer Manchurian and paneer tikka for the new year lunch party. And I must tell you that it was awesome. Your method of cooking just made my day and everyone so proud of me for making such dish.. Thanks
welcome nivedita. thanks for sharing your experience. wishing you and your family a very happy new year.
Hi dasanna,
Ur blog is too good and you explains the recipe so well. I tried many recipes from your blog. And this schezwan fried rice came out very well.. Thank you so much 🙂
welcome sumangala. thanks for sharing positive feedback on recipes.
nice
I tried the recipe with your schezwan sauce recipe. The taste was very good. Thank you for the recipe.
I didn’t add sugar in sauce. Is that make any difference in taste of sauce & rice?
thanks bhumika. sugar add a faint light sweetness. yes a subtle difference is there in the taste too.
Hi,
This looks yum have never tried making Chinese ever need to try .your post really makes hard work sound very easy.also the kale and mushroom looks quite good request for recipe or post on it too .also I think you are based in India so where did u get the kale from.have been searching for it for quite long.
thanks purvi. i will be adding the kale and mushroom recipe. kale is difficult to get in india. i purchase a few organic veggies from here and they have kale – http://greentokri.com/
Hi dassana,
I have noticed that on several chinese stalls they cook in iron wok on high flame.. so i also bought one to give that smoky flavor…but things get burnt though it does add smokiness… am i right to use iron wok or it doesnt matter!!.. anyways the dishes you use for serving are lovable..
even i have seen, monika. generally cast iron woks are a good bet. but the material should not be thin, then it will burn up the food. i have an iron kadai and i sometimes use it for stir frying. and never the food has got burnt in it. the serving dishes are a set of ceramic ware.
please share the recipe of kale and ginger sauce
garg, i will share the recipe soon.
I just came across you blog today looking for good Indian Street Food recipes, and I love all the recipes you have put up here, delicious and varied – I want to make it all! 😀 (I have taken note of some links to some recipes I gotta try 🙂 ) I hope you have a lovely start to your week!
x J
thanks jules for appreciating the recipes. enjoy the indian street food.
This is my most favourite rice dish. I never seem to get that smoky flavor though, inspite of frying at high temperature. Will have to try again.
Even I refrain from using chopper and food processor to cut vegetables. Somehow I feel that when I chop by hand, the final dish turns out better 🙂
And looks like even you don’t use ajinomoto. I do love the taste it gives to the dish but the harm it does is hard to ignore.
preeti, when we cut vegetables then the energies from us goes into vegetables and probably that makes a difference. thats why we should always cook food with love and devotion. i don’t use ajinomoto, obviously because of the harmful effects. try stir frying at highest flame and you will get the smoky flavor but at the same time stir continuously. needs lot of arm work.