As with every recipe for fried rice, start with cold (or at least room temperature) cooked rice. It doesn’t work with rice hot out of the cooker, which becomes heavy and stodgy when stir-fried.

I take a pretty freewheeling approach to making fried rice – I look to see what’s ... for another dish.) Slice the Chinese kale stem into rounds about 5mm ( ¼in) thick.

Think of this fried rice recipe as a template, not a dictum. If you don’t have beef jerky on hand, use leftover short ribs or spareribs, try some Chinese sausage, or skip the meat altogether.