One of the things we are excited about exploring in Europe is the amazing cuisine! We don't have much experience with Spanish food (that is not Mexican, haha!) and we want our kids to be familiar with some of the dishes before we get there. So we bought a Spanish cookbook, and last night we tried our first new dish : paella! I've eaten paella before, but never cooked it myself, mostly because of the cost of saffron. It is the essential spice to the dish, but costs $10 for a vial! It is harvested by hand from flowers, and they only get 1 tiny thread from each bloom, so that is why it is so costly. Worth it though if you are going to make the dish a lot!
Traditional paella has lots of seafood and snails, but for our first attempt I went with a meat paella that was easier and had a shorter shopping list. Chorizo sausage, chicken, and beef tenderloin in rice. True Spanish rice is a short grain called Bola, but it is not available here, so you can use arborio or even sushi rice. The meal is easier to make than I thought. Chop up peppers and meat, fry them in a pan, add chicken broth, roasted garlic, saffron, and the rice. Boil for a few minutes without stirring, then put the whole pan in a hot oven for 7 minutes. And presto: paella! The kids liked it, and the adults enjoyed it with a glass of Spanish red wine. We will definitely make it again, probably next time with seafood. :-)
Woohoo, your Spanish food looks great! Do try gazpacho as well - the perfect chilled summer soup. If you don't want to use fresh tomatoes, you can use a can of V8 for an American imitation.
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