Tokyo Joe's...on steriods

I had the most fabulous two days off of work this week.  I went down to Denver, stayed in CIVILIZATION (!!), had central heating, ate fast food (God bless Taco Bell), and slept in until whenever I damned well pleased.

Ahhhh.

I also spend an entire day (yes, one of the two) sitting on my rear end on the couch, watching cable television and drinking warm things.  Can I just say that I am obsessed with Food Network Channel?  I discovered a new (maybe new? I've been out of the loop for awhile) show called Chopped.  They bring in chefs from all over the world and challenge them to cook random, wierd foods.  The chefs only have 30 minutes each to prepare an appetizer, main course, and dessert.  They cooked things like rattlesnake, blood orange syrup, and hot cross buns.... all together in one dish. 

There's no chance I'd be able to whip up a tasty rattlesnake appetizer in 30 minutes.  Hell no.

I did learn a few things at least, though.

There was a chef from Japan competing against an Irish chef.  Their "secret ingredient" was some sort of fish... I'm not a huge seafood fan, or else it might have stuck in my mind.  Anyway, it doesn't really matter what kind of fish he cooked.  What matters is how he prepared it.  Pure genius.

He placed his plates--stone bowls, actually--in the oven while he prepared everything.  He then whipped up some sort of fish stir fry... I won't lie to you and tell you exactly everything he included, but when I reenacted it tonight, I used bell peppers, onion, garlic, broccoli, snap peas, and crushed red pepper.  Fried everything and added chicken (instead of chef's choice: fish)  and placed it on a bed of rice.

Here comes the kicker. 

Instead of placing everything on a regular china plate, put it in the stone bowls that you should have already heating up in the oven (about 400 degrees F).  Careful, the bowls will be very hot... but they'll keep everything warm for about 45 minutes; perfect for those slow eaters out there!

To make a real show, crack a fresh egg on top of everything in the stone bowl.  The heat from the stone will cook the egg, and you can mix it into the stir fry to make a delicious fried rice.

Bon appetit!