Summer Paella — Safer By This

I love a good rice dish. Briyani, Jambalaya, Risotto - basically if it’s a one pot dish with rice I’m probably down for it.

One of my very favourites is Paella.

I have such a vivid memory of the first time I had it. My family had been travelling through Europe and ended up in Barcelona. On our first night there we went out to dinner and my Dad ordered quickly. All I knew at that point was that it was a dish for the table, so no need to try to decipher the menu with the very small amount of Spanish my 11 year old self knew.

It was later than we would normally go out to dinner, and we’d been travelling most of the day, so we were all a little tired and cranky. Then out came this massive metal pan, covered in all kinds of seafood, and a wall of this unbelievable aroma. As they scooped it onto our plates I was mesmerized by the bright yellow colour of the rice against the pink shrimp and shiny black mussel shells.

I was instantly in love.

Later I would learn the wonders of pintxo and tapas, and tempranillo and rioja, but my first experience with Spanish food would stay with me.

So, when we got a new package of Saffron it was only logical that paella would be on Saturday’s menu.

I collected up the necessary ingredients

The peas are missing since they were still in the freezer!

3 cups rice (finding Bomba rice is tricky so I used Sushi Rice which works super well!)

4 1/2 cups broth (I did 2 cups of fish stock and 2 and 1/2 cups of chicken stock, but you can use whatever you prefer)

14oz chopped canned tomatoes

8 oz of dried chorizo

1 red Bell Pepper

1 large yellow onion

3 large cloves of garlic

1 cup of frozen peas

1 tsp saffron crocus

1 lb shrimp (deveined)

1 lb mussels

3 tbsp olive oil

Start by heating your broth in a pot until it reaches a low boil, then take it off the heat and let the saffron steep for at least 15 minutes.

While the saffron is steeping dice your pepper and onion and sauté with half the olive oil in a large oven safe pan. Cast iron is the best (if you don’t have a paella pan… which let’s be honest no one has), but anything that will give you nice even heat works.

Once the onions are translucent add the chorizo and sliced garlic to the pan cooking for another 2-3 minutes on low. At this point pre heat your oven to 350*.

Then you add the rice into the pan and the rest of the olive oil and cook stirring it until all the rice is coated and starts to go a little translucent. Once you’re there add the broth, tomatoes and peas into the pan. Stir carefully to make sure it’s all combined, this is the last time that you’re going to stir the dish! Then turn the heat down to low and cover, let it cook for 15 minutes.

After 15 minutes uncover, if the dish looks dry add another 1 cup of water then layer the shell fish on top. Make sure you put the mussels hinge side up so that when they open up the juices go into the rice.

Put the cover back on and put the whole thing into the oven for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes check on the dish, if the shrimp have changed colour and are pink you can pull it out, if not let it cook some more checking ever 2-3 minutes. Once the shrimp is pink the mussels should be open. If any haven’t opened you should discard those.

Slip a spatula between the rice and the edge of the pan, if it’s not browned you can put the pot back on the stove and put the heat back on for a couple of minutes until the bottom edge of the rice is brown and crisp. I promise you this part is worth it! The crispy edges are so good.