Mejadra is a fragrant Middle Eastern rice pilaf with crunchy fried onion throughout it. This is slightly adapted from a Yotam Ottolenghi recipe, from his wonderful cookbook Jerusalem. The main difference is that he uses dried lentils, I use canned. If you don't have time or don't want to deep fry, substitute the fried onions with Asian fried shallots, available from Asian stores and the Asian section of major supermarkets in Australia (Coles, Woolies). The taste is remarkably similar!