Leftover rice? Great for cleaning pans.

What do you do with a bowl of dried up leftover rice?



I used it to clean up my cooking pan when I am cooking this dish.



The sauce from it tend to stick all over the pan because of the corn starch I used to thicken the sauce. Instead of washing the sauce off to cook the next dish, I put a bowl of leftover rice into the pan and stir the grains all over the pan, then I add some water and stir again to clear up the sauce.

Now the leftover rice is all puff up...



...and ready to eat.



And of course, the pan is clean enough for cooking the next dish.



So, before you wash off that highly flavorful sauces and browned bits of meat or fish stuck to the bottom of a pan after cooking, read what Christopher Allen has to say about his fondness for fond.

I cannot find a better explanation to save time, water and energy from not washing pans before cooking each dish and not being labeled lazy by... my mother-in-law?