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Kimchi Fried Rice
Updated May 6, 2024
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- Total Time
- 30 minutes
- Cook Time
- 30 minutes
- Rating
- Notes
- Read community notes
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Ingredients
- 3tablespoons unsalted butter
- ½small onion, medium dice
- 1cup roughly chopped kimchi (6 ounces)
- 2tablespoons kimchi juice, or to taste
- ½cup small-dice Spam, ham or leftover cooked meat
- 2cups cooked, cooled rice (preferably short-grain)
- 2teaspoons soy sauce, or to taste
- 1teaspoon sesame oil, or to taste
- 2teaspoons vegetable oil
- 2eggs
- Salt to taste
- Crumbled or slivered nori (roasted seaweed) for garnish
- Sesame seeds for garnish
Preparation
- Step 1
In a nonstick sauté pan or well-seasoned cast-iron skillet, melt butter over medium-low heat, and add onions. Cook, stirring, until the onions start to sizzle, about 2 minutes. Add kimchi and kimchi juice, and stir until it comes to a boil, about 3 minutes. Add Spam, and cook until sauce is nearly dried out, about 5 minutes.
- Step 2
Break up the rice in the pan with a spatula, and stir it to incorporate. Turn heat to medium. Cook, stirring, until the rice has absorbed the sauce and is very hot, about 5 minutes. Stir in soy sauce and sesame oil. Taste, and adjust with more soy sauce, sesame oil or kimchi juice. Turn heat down slightly, but let the rice continue to cook, untouched, to lightly brown while you cook the eggs.
- Step 3
Place a small nonstick sauté pan over medium heat, and add the vegetable oil. When it is hot, add eggs, season with salt and fry to your desired doneness. Serve rice topped with fried eggs, nori and a sprinkle of sesame seeds.
Private Notes
Cooking Notes
An essential condiment in my kitchen is the fermented chile paste called gojuchang. Sweet, spicy, smoky and sour, I add a bit to stir fries, soups and sauces. It's great - I'm kind of hooked on the stuff.
In this recipe, I'd add a heaping tablespoon of gojuchang with the kimchi in step 1 for heat and flavor. It adds a depth of flavor and a glossy redness to everything it touches - including your rubber utensils.
I doubled the kim chi and kim chi juice (this ups the spice level considerably, and be sure to use old kim chi for the best tastes). I cut the SPAM and fried four eggs instead (two each) for protein. It tasted JUST like our favorite Bokkeumbap dish, a kim chi fried rice that is actually made at the table after a Korean BBQ meal with all the leftover meats and sides. This is a delicious recipe, Korean Husband approved! Hoping I can do with 2 TBS of butter (I used salted) to cut the fat next time.
This is completely addictive. Make as written. Do not substitute. You won't be sorry. You will only contemplate how empty your life was before this recipe.
As a full-fledged Korean, I can tell you this recipe is the bomb! Soy sauce is unnecessary, as you get plenty of salt from the kimchee and nori. It's good to cook this in a cast-iron pan so you get the crunchy goodness on the bottom. Even better with a drizzle of sriracha sauce at the end! Yum!
And if you're dead-set against SPAM, diced, cooked Portuguese sausage (linguica) or even bacon work great, too.
If you're in/near New Jersey, try it with pork roll.
I was looking for an authentic kimchi fried rice recipe and this is it! To make the recipe vegetarian, I used boiled tofu in place of spam. I used brown rice for this. Very delicious and easy.
Added garlic, diced carrot and bell pepper, sliced mushrooms. Didn't have any leftover meat, so this version vegetarian. Good!
I made this recipe to serve 30 instead of 2 for a party. Was a big hit and the pot was empty! What I changed : Added 3 Thai Red chiles & 1 Tbsp of grated fresh ginger. I scrambled the eggs instead of frying and also garnished with some scallion. I also eliminated the spam/ham. As far as proportions, I used 4.5 cups of dry rice, 2 medium onions, 64 oz jar of Kimchi and all the juice. Can't wait to make it again!!
This was a delicious and easy way to use up leftover rice! I also made a couple modifications: I wanted more protein, so I scrambled 4 eggs with green onion and a little soy sauce, then mixed that in with the rice. I also used 2 slices of bacon for the meat, skipped the butter, and added a TB of gochujang to soften the bite of the kimchi. This was the best fried rice I’ve ever made!
Where's the gochujang in this recipe?? Gotta have gochujang in your kimchee fried rice.
I have made this several times now and it is so perfect! You can use left over rice (which I keep handy in the freezer) and whatever veggies or meat you have on hand. Made it with left-over roasted chicken, pancetta or sausage. I added peas one time and lightly sautéed kale another. The kimchi I use is very spicy and so not much else is needed. Really fabulous recipe to take off on and do your own thing!
Dead probiotic bacteria still provide virtually the same health benefits as living bacteria, so it's not really something you need to be worrying about, especially if your normal diet already includes other fermented foods. Cooking the kimchi with the other ingredients infuses everything with the delicious flavor, so adding it alone after everything else has already cooked would mean you're missing out on the true beauty of the dish. Go ahead and cook your kimchi.
In reply to Richard: I would try some fried tofu. Most Asian supermarkets or specialties stores will have pre-fried cold tofu available. It retains its chew and soaks up flavor well if slowly.
This is a fantastic fried rice recipe; initially I thought that the kimchi would be overpowering, but it was perfect. I swapped the spam out with some chopped bulgolgi beef from the night before and added a little bit of gochujang at the end for a bit more spice. I'll be making this recipe many more times in the future!
I love this recipe and I use it for a dish I call the Good Fork Special, named after the restaurant in Red Hook where I first had it. Make the rice according to the recipe, no Spam. Top with the following, in order: a fistful of watercress or other bitter salad greens; a small piece of pan-broiled skirt steak; a soft fried egg; kizami nori. Yum.
Delish! We had some kimchi rice at a restaurant in Portland, ME and couldn't wait to come home to give it a try. This recipe did not disappoint.
Gochugsng sauce edename
I made this several times and used whatever meat I have extra - with prosciutto (feels fancy but tasted the best), bacon, speck, chorizo, prawns. Always tasted lovely. In the most recent one I used cauliflower rice. I “fried” the cauliflower first to dry it up so not too soggy. Took it out of the pan. Then after that I followed the recipe’s steps, substituting rice with cauliflower. Tastes amazingly almost same as it was with rice.
My daughter in law made this recipe and I absolutely loved it. So much so that a couple days later I made it myself. I use bacon instead of Spam, it was so delicious. Will be a go to recipe from now on.
Great recipe- doubled onions, spam and kimchi. Lasts in the fridge a good long time.
Surprisingly good. Added grated ginger, sweet soy sauce and a miso can of shredded cabbage and cucumbers in a dressing of rice wine and sesame oil. I used diced ham instead of Spam.
We thought this was good, not great. Made as written except ended up cooking at higher temp. (At med low, the onions were just sitting in a pool of warm butter, not cooking) It was quite salty between the Spam (a very salty product) and soy sauce. I tried adding gochujang to a small portion and felt it altered the flavor too much. The nori is a key flavor component that improved the dish quite a bit.
This was great and so easy! Substituted leeks for onion and no spam. Will definitely make again and try the 1 Tbs of peanut butter! Thanks for suggesting
This was unexpectedly amazing. Added tofu instead of spam but otherwise stayed true to the recipe. My daughter sliced an avocado on top and it was excellent. And for once, it was as fast as the recipe claims! Great keeper for a quick weekend night dinner.
Delicious! - replaced spam with diced tempeh that I browned along with the onions / butter and then added the kimchi.
Yummy and quick! Made 3x the recipe to feed my family of 4 (with 2 hungry teenagers) and have leftovers for lunch. Used 1 large and 1 small leftover rice from Chinese takeout. Otherwise followed the recipe (x3).The crispy rice was the best. I’ll definitely use this technique whenever I make fried rice from now on. Next time, I’ll follow others’ advice and use pork belly in place of the spam and add gochujang. Again, yum!
Used some seitan that was in the fridge and plonked two fried eggs on top. Super filling and delicious with lots of salty warmth. Will leave undisturbed in the cast-iron pan a little longer next time to get crunchy rice.
SOOOOO good! I added celery, carrots, green onion, and used bacon... It was incredible!
Def a keeper! Made it with tempeh bacon in place of Spam. And my kimchi didn't have much liquid, so I just rinsed a small portion with water and strained that to use for the liquid component.
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