We have a Tapas and Paella night coming up in September so I thought I ought to start practicing for the night. I cooked up this Paella tonight. Chicken, prawn and squid rings. Red pepper and peas, and a shortcut using shop bought passata instead of making a pukka tomato sauce.
I cook with an induction hob and cannot use a traditional paella pan so use this Le Creuset non stick paella pan. Unfortunately this means we don’t get much of a Socarrat on the base.
The recipe was an interpretation of one of the straight forward and simpler recipes from “Paella” by Alberto Herraiz. The book explores some of the traditional methods and recipes of cooking the dish, delving into the near science behind cooking paella.
A lot of the recipes in the book start on the stove before cooking in the oven which seems a little unusual to me. I always thought of paella as being a stove top recipe.
