Hawaiian Fried Rice

Living in the FEMA trailer is strange. It feels like our house but smaller and temporary. I sleep on a narrow bunk and can hear everybody breathing at night. Daddy works long hours gutting the house himself because contractors are booked for a year. The noise of hammers and saws is constant.

This week I helped Mama organize what we could save. Most of the photo albums are ruined, but we found a few pictures that dried okay. Kayla cried when she saw her art supplies ruined. I hugged her and promised we'd make new drawings together.

MawMaw Shirley came again with more food. She brought gumbo this time, made in her big cast iron pot. We ate it sitting on folding chairs in the driveway. The taste of dark roux made everything feel a little less broken.

I tried to keep my notebook going. I wrote a simple recipe for "FEMA trailer jambalaya" using what we had in coolers. It wasn't fancy, but it fed us.

At night in the trailer I wrote: "Home isn't just walls. It's the people and the food we share even when everything is wet." Twelve years old and my round face feels older in the mirror. The flood took a lot, but MawMaw's words keep coming back — don't rush the roux. Don't rush the rebuilding. I'm stirring through the mess.

That FEMA trailer jambalaya got us through the worst of it, but once things settled a little, I wanted to cook something that felt lighter—something that didn’t carry the weight of the flood in every bite. Hawaiian Fried Rice became my go-to because it uses the same kind of humble, make-do ingredients we had on hand, but it tastes like a little bit of sunshine instead of survival. There’s something about the pineapple and the SPAM together that just makes you smile, and after all those nights in that trailer, we needed more smiling. Here’s how I made it.

Prep Time: 10 min | Cook Time: 20 min | Total Time: 30 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

3 cups cooked white rice (day-old works best)
1 can (12 oz) SPAM or canned ham, diced into 1/2-inch cubes
1 cup canned pineapple chunks, drained
3 large eggs
1/2 cup frozen peas and carrots (or canned, drained)
3 green onions, sliced thin
3 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon butter or vegetable oil
1 teaspoon sesame oil (optional)
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Instructions

Heat the pan. Set a large skillet or wok over medium-high heat. Add butter or oil and let it get hot — about 1 minute.
Brown the meat. Add diced SPAM or canned ham in a single layer. Cook without stirring for 2–3 minutes until the edges turn golden. Stir and cook 1 minute more, then push to the side of the pan.
Scramble the eggs. Crack eggs into the empty side of the pan. Break the yolks and scramble gently, pulling the curds together until just set, about 90 seconds. Fold into the meat.
Add the vegetables. Stir in peas and carrots. Cook 2 minutes until heated through.
Add the rice. Add the cold cooked rice, breaking up any clumps with a spatula. Press the rice against the hot pan in sections and let it sit undisturbed for 1 minute at a time to develop some color. Stir and repeat.
Season and sweeten. Drizzle soy sauce evenly over the rice. Add pineapple chunks and toss everything together. Cook 2–3 more minutes, stirring occasionally, until the pineapple is warmed and the flavors come together.
Finish and serve. Remove from heat. Drizzle with sesame oil if using. Scatter green onions on top. Serve hot, straight from the pan.

Nutrition (per serving)

Hawaiian Fried Rice — MawMaw’s Kitchen Lives On, Even in a Cooler