Spanish Paella

Paella sounded good for dinner tonight so I picked up a few missing ingredients today at lunch time. Our friend Robert and his son Alex popped in to join us as did my niece Claudia. We sat outside, drank a little wine, talked about Aliens, politics, and the Loch Ness Monster. The conversation is always "interesting" when Robert is involved. Anyhow it was a really nice evening and a good kick off for the weekend. Plus the Angels won tonight.  

Spanish Paella

This is a recipe that I adapted from a book my friend Patty gave me. I am known to continuously adjust recipes every time I make a dish. This however came out so good the first time that I was asked to just “leave it alone”! If you can find Paella rice fine, if not I used Arborio and it worked very well. For the stock I used a combination of lobster and chicken base dissolved into 5 cups of hot water

2 cups Arborio rice, rinsed

6-7 links Spanish chorizo or hot Italian sausage

24 shrimp shelled and deveined

1 can baby clams, drained

2 medium onions, chopped

6 cloves chopped garlic

6 Tbs. olive oil

1 cup frozen peas

½ lb. fresh green beans chopped

5 cups fish or chicken stock

Made from 1tsp lobster and 2 tsp chicken base dissolved in the 5 cups of water

1 red bell pepper seeded & sliced

½ tsp saffron threads

1 tsp smoked paprika

2 Tbs. fresh chopped parsley

Salt and pepper to taste

 

     Put the sausage links in a shallow dish and cook in a 375 oven for about 20 minutes. Cut into ¼ inch slices and set aside. Heat the olive oil in a very large skillet or Paella pan. Add the onions and cook for 3-4 minutes stirring frequently. Add the garlic and paprika and cook for 2-3 minutes. Add the rice, green beans, peas, stock and saffron. Stir and add salt and pepper to taste. Bring to a boil stirring constantly. Reduce heat to low and let simmer uncovered and without stirring for about 15 minutes cook until rice is almost tender and most of the liquid has been absorbed. Add sausage, shrimp, clams and red bell pepper to the top of the dish without stirring. Cover and simmer for an additional 5 minutes. Add the parsley and stir very gently. Taste and adjust the seasoning if necessary. Serve immediately.