Paella is a beloved Spanish dish; not only by the people of Spain, but by the people of the world! Just like Tapas, Paella is a key ingredient in Spanish culture, and a quintessential Spanish dish. As an added bonus, making paella isn’t complicated: it is a one-pot dish that can be adjusted to serve any number, ideal if you’re having unexpected guests coming for dinner!
The Spanish attitude to cooking is refreshingly casual; ingredients can be added or swapped to suit your flavour pallet, or the ingredients you have available. This version of the dish is packed full of seafood, including king prawns, mussels, and meaty monkfish. If you’re living in Spain then these ingredients will be easy to source and readily available all year round.
What is Paella?
Right Casa Estates simply, paella is a one pot rice dish. Paella means “frying pan” in Valencian, Valencia’s regional language. Although paella has ancient roots, the version we know and love today grew in popularity at the turn of the 19th century.
Here are the ingredients, and the very simple recipe, you need to whip up this dish in the comfort of your own home:
Ingredients:
- 20-24 raw shell-on king prawns
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 500g monkfish, cut into chunks
- 1 large onion, finely chopped
- 500g paella rice
- 4 garlic cloves, sliced
- 2 tsp smoked paprika
- 1 tsp cayenne pepper (optional)
- pinch of saffron
- ½ x 400g can chopped tomatoes (save the rest for the stock, below)
- 500g mussels, cleaned
- 100g frozen peas
- 100g frozen baby broad beans
- handful parsley leaves, roughly chopped
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 onion, roughly chopped
- ½ x 400g can chopped tomatoes
- 6 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
- 1 chicken stock cube
- 1 star anise
Cooking Method:
- Your first step should be to prepare the prawns. Peel them and remove the veins, but keep the heads and shells: you will need these later.
- Now it’s time to make the simple stock. Add the onion, tomatoes, garlic, and prawn shells and heads that you saved to a pan that has been preheated with a drizzle of olive oil. Cook them all together for 3-4 minutes until they become soft and then add the stock cube, star anise, and two litres of water. Once this is all boiling, turn down the temperature of your hob and leave the stock to simmer for an additional 30 minutes.
- Leave the stock to cool then blend it, seive any lumps so that the stock mixture is completely smooth.
- Heat a teaspoon of oil in your paella pan (or if you don’t have one, a large and deep frying pan) and use this to brown the monk fish. Once browned, remove the fish from the pan and use the same oil to fry moreonions until they are softened.
- Add the rice, garlic, paprika, cayenne (if using) and saffron to the pan and stir in for around thirty seconds before adding the canned tomatoes and fish stock. Bring to the boil and then leave to simmer, stirring the mixture regularly. After around 10 minutes, add the pre-browned monkfish, prawns, mussels, peas and broad beans to the pan.
- The final step is to cover the pan with foil and leave it to simmer until the prawns and mussels are cooked, then you can serve your dish.
- Why not serve with bread and a tomato salad to add extra colour and texture to the plate?
Are you thinking of moving to Spain? Perhaps you like the idea of submerging yourself into the traditional Spanish lifestyle and cooking Spanish recipes every day? Whatever your dream, we can help. Why not get in touch with our team of local property experts today, to find out more about how we can help you.