Make the rice the day before.

Pandora has it correct. Fresh rice is not ideal at all for fried rice.. Too much loose starch still running around.

Ok, I'll try that. How do the pros do it, though? When I see it done at a Chinese restaurant, it looks like they're pulling fresh rice out of the same supply they use for everything else.

ThI've never been in the kitchen of a chinese restaurant, my guess is there is probably two tubs, one with fresh rice and one wiht day old cold rice.

To be clear, I can definitely see why day-old rice will work better, and I'm going to try it. I also wonder whether simply making a pot of rice and setting it out on a silpat to dry out for an hour or two might do the same thing.
(I rarely decide what to cook any sooner than the same day I make it, except for Sunday dinner.)

However, I definitely saw it done with fresh rice at a take-out place where the kitchen was visible from the counter, and the rice steamer was right up front. They were filling containers of plain rice and fetching rice for fried rice from the very same pot. <shrug>

I read you can put the rice in the freezer to dry it out. Do you have a rice maker, maybe try it with rice maker rice and see what happens right form the cooker? I don't have a rice cooker, so I can't try it.

Well, the leftover rice trick worked, but I'm not counting it because it was leftover Chinese take-out rice. Next time I'll make my own.

I also made my stir-fried-random several thousand miles too far to the West.
Instead of soy sauce it contained breaded chicken, hot cherry peppers, the vinegar from the cherry peppers jar, and shredded parmesan cheese. Not even close to what I'm trying to perfect but damn it was good.

That sounds really good. Now I want some of that.

that does sound good.

It was surprisingly good for a "throw in whatever's in the fridge" lunch that came together in about five minutes.

Tonight's "sunday dinner" was a really good pot roast. Even though I am a board-certified Italian grandmother, not every Sunday dinner has to be pasta and meatballs with homemade sauce (even though mine are the absolute best).

I went with Chef John's recipe:
[ https://foodwishes.blogspot.com/2011/10/classic-slow-cooker-beef-pot-roast.html ]

Except the two pieces of bone-in chuck that I needed to feed six did not fit in my slow cooker, so I put everything in a tightly sealed roasting pan and texted the braisemaster (Aahz) to get help calculating the oven time and temperature (2.5 hours at 325F, in case you were wondering).

Really really good. I made some homemade mashed potatoes and a vegetable to go with it, and everyone just devoured it.

Last Christmas my mother made "three packet pot roast" which apparently is made with a packet of MSG, another packet of MSG, and a third packet of MSG. I can't *taste* MSG, but there's a way it sort of "feels" on the sides of my tongue that I know it's there. My wife knows it's there from the migraine she gets after eating it. I wonder if she'd be willing to adopt my zero-packet recipe.

There's a certain satisfaction to be had in cooking from scratch and knowing that there's not a single chemical anywhere on the table. Beef, mushrooms, onions, tomatoes, carrots, celery, salt, pepper, flour, potatoes, butter, cream, and a frozen vegetable (the lady of the house prefers peas with roasted meats).

Anyway, it's totally worth it to go for the bone-in chuck roasts (the "7-bone" as they call it). The ample connective tissue that makes it so cheap because it isn't any good for grilling, also makes it perfect for a low and slow braise.

What do y'all put in your pot roast?

Now that's making me think I really need to do some cooking. Too bad there isn't a holiday coming up where I'd make an insane amount of food from scratch.

I was considering Turkey sashimi...

I tried the three packet pot roast and it was SO BLAND. I don't have a recipe I follow usually, I saute onions, garlic, sometimes mushrooms in the same pan I have browned the outside of the roast in, deglaze with some wine, throw the meat back in and braise it until tender.

three packet?

I've been getting into braising lately, but I just can't make myself like pot roast. (Beef chili is a different story.)

Pork shoulder, lamb shanks, etc, all things I enjoy. But for some reason, I loathe the taste of slow-cooked beef unless it's well-spiced.

three packet?

"Three packet pot roast" is a packet of Italian dressing mix, a packet of Ranch dressing mix, a packet of brown gravy mix, and a beef roast, cooked in a slow cooker.

As I pointed out earlier, it's basically just a big plate of MSG.

The other problem is that it's a "plop and stir" recipe; some people don't even bother browning the meat before they cook it, which is why so many slow cooker recipes are bland

Absolutely. Brown it on a smoking-hot cast iron skillet, in small batches, before transferring.

Even then, though, I'm still not a fan of beef done this way, unless heavily spiced. Certainly not chuck roast, and I'm lukewarm about short rib as well. Brisket might be an exception, but we don't see it at the store very frequently.

On the other hand, I've got a Moroccan-style lamb tagine recipe that very explicitly does not call for browning: "start it cold", "do not allow the meat to brown." Done that way in order to be authentic. It's just lightly spiced, and sweetened with apricot and maybe raisin, so, unusually, it actually brings out some of the more subtle flavors. Very polarizing - some people think it's missing something - you either love it or you hate it.

I made my own salt preserved lemons to make tagine. Though I brown my meat because I hate the textyure otherwise.