Chilli Garlic Fried Rice
Chilli garlic fried rice starts with a fiery homemade chilli garlic paste, tossed with fresh vegetables and fluffy rice before being coated with a rich, salty, and piquant sauce to bring everything together. Because we stir-fry everything over high heat, achieving that authentic takeaway Indo-Chinese smoky flavour that complements the spice is downright EASY.
You know those tongue-tinglingly spicy foods — you can’t help but go back for seconds, even while your mouth is still burning? That’s the best way to describe this Indo-Chinese chilli garlic fried rice recipe. It’s not for the faint-hearted!
Chilli garlic fried rice doesn’t just bring a flavour explosion. It’s also a joy to cook. Like chitranna (South Indian lemon rice), Indian-style egg fried rice, or mosaranna (curd rice), you can use leftover rice to make the cooking experience even more streamlined. Then, it can be on the table in less than 30 minutes, AND it’s a one-pot meal.
Tasty enough to serve as a main dish, you can bulk out chilli garlic rice with your choice of proteins … although even the base recipe is one of the most tempting ways to work in fresh veggies.
🍚 Ingredients for Chilli Garlic Fried Rice
Everything you’ll need to make homemade chilli garlic fried rice can be split into three categories: the rice, the vegetables, and the seasoning sauce. If you don’t already have these things stocked in your pantry, a trip to your local Asian supermarket should set you up nicely.
- Basmati rice is gloriously long, fluffy, and incredibly aromatic. If you don’t like basmati, use another rice variety (jasmine rice would be delicious).
- Oil (any neutral oil) is essential for stir-frying all the ingredients and intensifying their flavours.
- Minced ginger is invigoratingly spicy, in a warmer way than chilli peppers.
- Green beans taste fresh, green, and crunchy.
- Carrot is great for colour but also brings out a unique nutty sweetness.
- Red bell pepper contrasts with its cousin, the chilli pepper, by offering a subtle mild pepperiness accompanied by a crisp texture.
- Red onions are sharp and sweet.
- Light soy sauce adds a salty, savoury taste throughout our chilli garlic fried rice.
- Dark soy sauce is packed with caramelised richness and bags of umami. Please don’t skip it!
- Rice vinegar provides a slight tang, balancing the spiciness of the chilli garlic paste.
- Vegan fish sauce is an optional ingredient, but adds complexity thanks to its earthy, briney, taste. It’s available in vegan stores, health food shops, or online.
- Sugar balances everything out. The rice doesn’t become sweet.
🌶️ Homemade Chilli Garlic Paste
The KEY to this chilli garlic fried rice is the homemade paste. Much like my Thai basil fried rice, the paste is easy to make — it requires just two ingredients — but adds an unbelievable amount of flavour.
It’s responsible for the characteristic smokiness, fiery heat, warmth, and slightly fruity undernotes of the chilli garlic fried rice.
I assure you it’s worth it to make your own, although a store-bought paste can be subbed in.
- Dried red chillis bring the heat. Adjust the variety you use depending on how hot you’d like the paste. While Kashmiri chillis or byadagi chillis will provide the same vibrant colour without as much heat, smooth guntur chillis are my recommendation. They’re easy to find in any Asian store and are usually labelled non-descriptively as “dry chillis.” Whichever you pick, make sure it’s an Indian variety for the most authentic flavour!
- Garlic is just as vital as chillis. When the paste is raw, the garlic will be pungent and sharp. When cooked, it will mellow out to a buttery taste.
🔄 Ingredient Substitutions, Variations, and Allergy Info
Chilli garlic fried rice is 100% vegan and nut free as written. For this reason, it’s an amazing crowd-pleaser. It’s one of my go-to dishes whenever I’m cooking for a crowd with dietary preferences or requirements.
However, the Indo-Chinese spicy fried rice recipe isn’t naturally gluten free. Why? Soy sauce is the issue here — the brewing process includes gluten. Luckily, there’s an easy fix. To make chilli garlic fried rice gluten free, swap light and dark soy sauce for tamari. It’s a change I’ve made many times, to the point that my Mum prefers tamari now!
Unfortunately, it’s not possible to make the dish soy free without eliminating soy sauce. Although you can do this, it will change the taste of the recipe, and I recommend balancing the dish with a little extra sugar or tomato paste for natural umami.
Children or people with a lower spice tolerance might find this recipe far too spicy. In that case, significantly lower the chilli content (although expect to lose some of that gorgeous orange colour, too).
Allergies aside, you can have so much fun with this recipe!
For example, you can add some ingredients to up the protein content and make the dish more filling:
- Use homemade tofu for vegan plant-powered protein. Cut it into chunks, give it a quick pre-fry, and then toss with the rice. Instant boost!
- Add paneer. While this option isn’t vegan, it is popular in India! Paneer is an Indian semi-hard cheese that doesn’t melt under heat, making it ideal for stir-frying. Again, it’s an easy way to add protein.
- Use vegetarian meat substitutes like seitan “chicken” or faux seafood.
Plus, there’s scope to play around with the vegetables, too! Why not add broccoli, beansprouts, mushrooms, bamboo shoots, lotus root, or water chestnuts? I’m salivating just thinking about it …
🧑🍳 How to Make Chilli Garlic Fried Rice
Get your chef’s apron and wok ready — we’re about to cook up a storm!
Cooking chilli garlic fried rice is ridiculously simple, especially if you have leftover rice. In that case, it’s just a matter of mixing up a sauce and stir-frying a few ingredients. It couldn’t be simpler!
- Make the chilli garlic paste by soaking dried chillis in hot water for around 15 minutes, until re-hydrated. Drain and add to a blender along with garlic, then grind to a coarse paste.
- Mix the stir-fry sauce by combining light and dark soy sauce, rice vinegar, vegan fish sauce (optional) and sugar in a small bowl.
- Heat oil in a large wok until smoking out, then add the homemade chilli garlic paste. Cook until aromatic then stir-fry the ginger, carrot, green beans, bell peppers, and onions.
- Add the cooked rice and prepared stir-fry sauce. Toss everything to mix.
In case you don’t have leftover rice, no worries. You’ll need to cook the rice fresh, then leave it to cool. While I usually use the absorption method to cook fluffy rice, I find this technique easier for fluffier fried rice. It doesn’t require breaking up the rice after cooking, which means more lovely fluffy grains (rice is delicate).
- Wash the rice — I can’t emphasize how important this is! Since we aren’t rinsing the rice after cooking, we need to wash the starches out at the beginning. Rinse the rice in a small bowl until the water runs clear.
- Boil the rice in a large saucepan with plenty of salted water. You’ll need a lot of water and you want it at a simmer. After around 12-15 minutes, drain the rice. A bit al-dente is perfect since we’ll be stir-frying it later.
- Leave the rice to cool by spreading it out on a large plate.
Cookware You Need
💡 Expert Tips for Chilli Garlic Fried Rice
I’ve been cooking fried rice for YEARS, and I’ve learnt that great technique can make the difference between regular, run-of-the-mill fried rice and EXCEPTIONAL world-shattering fried rice.
I’m here to teach you the world-shattering fried rice, obviously. So here are some things to bear in mind once you get cooking, to elevate your chilli garlic fried rice to the next level:
- Use leftover or cold rice for the absolute best texture. Freshly cooked rice is extremely delicate — meaning it easily breaks, especially when stir-frying. Day-old leftover rice is best, but in a pinch, you can make fresh rice and leave it to cool in the refrigerator.
- Prep your vegetables before you start cooking. Mincing vegetables can take time, and when we’re cooking over high heat, there’s no time for anything else — all your attention needs to be on the stove.
- Cookware matters when making Indo-Chinese recipes! You’ll want a good quality wok or round-bottomed kadai to stir-fry properly.
- High heat is your friend. This is how we achieve the “wok hei” or “taste of the wok” that’s so prevalent in takeaway food. Wondering why your stir-fried rice doesn’t taste like the restaurant? This is why! Get your cookware SMOKING hot before you start, do the prep beforehand, and you’re guaranteed that delicious smoky flavour we all crave.
- Chop your vegetables evenly to ensure everything cooks uniformly. There’s nothing worse than mushy bell peppers and raw carrots!
- Once you’ve cooked the recipe a few times, adapt it by adding different veggies or proteins! That’s the fun of cooking.
🍱 What to Serve with this Spicy Rice
This chilli garlic fried rice recipe tastes fantastic on its own. I mean it — there’s no need to serve anything else on the dinner table. Just one bowl each, and the whole family will be happy!
However, if you want to make a feast of things, why not dish up a whole range of Indo-Chinese or Asian treats? Start with an appetizer of toothsome salt and pepper tofu or crispy fried chilli paneer, then move on to noodles with plain chow mein or Hakka noodles. After that, you’ll need a saucy curry dish to soak into the rice and noodles — mushroom manchurian or tofu satay curry are my top choices.
Phew! After that feast, you’ll be sorted for a whole week!
🤤 Why You Should Make Chilli Garlic Fried Rice
Chilli Garlic Fried Rice
Indo-Chinese chilli garlic fried rice is made from fluffy rice tossed with veggies, umami-packed sauces, and fiery, fruity, smoky chillis.
Ingredients
To Make the Chilli Garlic Paste
- 5 Dried Red Guntur Chillis*
- 10 Garlic Cloves (peeled)
To Make the Stir Fry
- 490 - 500g Leftover Basmati Rice**
- 1 tbsp Neutral Oil
- 1/2 tsp Ginger, minced
- 50g Green Beans, diced
- 50g Carrot (1 Medium), diced
- 20g Red Bell Pepper, diced
- 20g Red Onion, diced
To Make the Stir-Fry Sauce
- 1 tbsp Light Soy Sauce
- 1.5 tbsp Dark Soy Sauce
- 1 tsp Rice Vinegar
- 1/2 tsp Vegan Fish Sauce (optional)
- 1 tsp Sugar
- Salt, to taste***
Instructions
- Make the chilli garlic paste. Soak the dried chillis in plenty of hot water for around 10-15 minutes. Once rehydrated, drain the water and add to a high-powered blender along with garlic. Grind to a coarse paste, scraping down your blender when necessary.
- Make the stir-fry sauce. Mix all the ingredients listed under "stir-fry sauce" in a small bowl and set aside.
- Begin to stir-fry. Over a high flame, heat a large wok until smoking. Add the oil and immediately stir-fry the chilli garlic paste. Once it becomes aromatic (a few seconds), add the minced ginger, carrot, green beans, bell peppers, and onions (in that order). Stir-fry for around 30 seconds - 1 minute — we want to retrain some crunch.
- Add the rice to the wok and pour the stir-fry sauce on top. Immediately begin to toss everything together to mix.
Optionally, serve with slithers of sliced spring onions (scallions).
Notes
* Guntur Chillis are "standard" red dried chillies you'll find at most Indian supermarkets, with a medium spice level. To decrease the heat, use Kashmiri or Bygadi chillis. To increase, use dried Naga chillis (Fair warning: This will be INCREDIBLY spicy).
** If you don't want to use or don't have leftover rice, no issues. Substitute this for 200g raw basmati rice and follow these instructions:
- Wash the rice — I can’t emphasize how important this is! Since we aren’t rinsing the rice after cooking, we need to wash the starches out at the beginning. Rinse the rice in a small bowl until the water runs clear, at least four times.
- Boil the rice. In a large saucepan, add plenty of salted water (you'll need a lot) and bring it to a gentle simmer. Add the washed rice and cook for around 10-15 minutes, then carefully drain. We want the rice slightly al-dente, especially as it will continue to cook in its residual heat.
- Cool the rice. Carefully spread the cooked rice on a large platter and leave to cool for AT LEAST an hour.
*** Be careful with over-salting this dish, as we generally add salt to cook rice and soy sauce is salty. Add salt last and taste test beforehand!
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Nutrition Information:
Yield: 4 Serving Size: 1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 1404Total Fat: 34.7gSaturated Fat: 6.9gCholesterol: 21mgSodium: 5142mgCarbohydrates: 248.2gFiber: 14.9gSugar: 42.8gProtein: 35.3g
