The Perfect Spanish Dish!

As we are cooking traditional foods in every country, for Spain, we found a cooking class where we learned how to cook a dish called seafood paella (pronounced pie-ye
-ya). It was a really neat class and the paella was delicious!

There were also other people in the class, about 20 people including our family. We sat with three other ladies who were from California and at the other table was a group of girls from all over the USA. They were all going to universities in different parts of Europe like Ireland, England, and Spain. This has shown me all of the possibilities and experiences that one can have while in university. It was kind of funny because there was another girl with the same name as me (Mikhaila)! My dad was the only guy in the class, but he didn’t seem to mind. 🙂

Before we got to the cooking school where we would be making the dish, the chef who was teaching us, named Fernando, took us to St. Josep’s market to purchase our ingredients fresh. We went to a seafood stall and bought fresh mussels, clams, squid, and prawns. When we had all the ingredients, we went to a stall selling fruit drinks run by Fernando’s friends. I got a mango pineapple and it was so delicious!

The fish

The shrimp

The calamari or squid

The fruit drinks!

Instead of starting right away with the cooking, we learned how to prepare the ingredients for paella. Fernando showed us how to chop up peppers and onions without having your eyes tear up. He also showed us where to put our hands and the knife. Then he taught us how to prepare all the types of seafood. After, we were split into groups to do different things to help prepare the meal.

Cutting the peppers

Chopping the onions

Fellow students preparing the vegetables

I was in the group that prepared the seafood and I had a lot of fun doing this prep work. For the mussels, you need to pull off their “beards” (little bits of seaweed-like hair attached to the inside of the shell) and rinse them in cold water. As soon as the beard is off, the mussels start to die, so we needed to work quickly to make sure we ate them fresh. For the clams and prawns, all you need to do is rinse them in cold water.

The seafood group

Fernando showing us how to prepare the mussels

Preparing the mussels!

The seafood we prepared

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to prepare the squid, but I still know the process. First you lay the squid on your hand and pull out it’s spine, which looks like a strip of clear plastic. Then you stick your finger into the hole where the spine was, hook your finger, and pull out the insides. Remove the head from the body and rinse it. Turn the head with the tentacles over so they’re facing up. Squeeze the head until a tall lump of squid comes out. This is the tooth in the gums. Pull the tooth and gums out of the squid. Slice up the body to form rings, and your squid is ready to cook!

Fernando teaching us how to prepare the squid

The squid is ready!

Now for the recipe….

Ingredients:

• Olive oil
• 10-15 cloves of garlic (one per person)
• 2 Onions, 1 green and ½ red pepper chopped small
• 200g Calamari rings, head and tentacles
• 100/150g Clams
• 200cc White wine
• 250g Mussels
• 2 cups of tomato sauce
• 3 cups of water
• 7 bay leaves
• 1/4 g saffron
• 200/250g Prawns/Shrimps
• 500/600g of Arborio Rice
• 1 cup Green peas
• Warm water (enough to cover every grain of rice)
• ½ L Fish stock
• Lemon and spices are great for a topping at the end

Cooking Process:

(To mix, put all of the ingredients into the middle of the pan and mix in a circular motion outwards.)

1) Pour a lot of olive oil onto a pan. (Make sure you use a flat pan such as a frying pan, not a wok)

2) Put the garlic onto the oil and start mixing with a wooden spoon.

3) Add the chopped peppers and onions and mix fifteen times.

Mixing the veggies!

4) Add the tenticals of the calamari into the middle. Make them dance/wiggle them before putting on the pan. Do not mix.

5) Add the sliced calamari into the middle and do not mix.

6) With the wooden spoon, push the vegetables towards the calamari without mixing them together.

7) Wait five seconds and then mix it together.

8) Mix fourteen more times.

9) Add parsley on top being careful not to put them on the pan.

10) Carefully, add the clams into the middle.

11) Push the ingredients in the pan towards the calamari without mixing them together.

12) Wait five seconds before mixing all of the ingredients together.

13) Move the food to the edge of the pot making a hole in the middle.

14) Pour some cold white wine into the hole in the middle.

15) Wait thirty seconds before mixing ingredients in the pan together.

16) Slowly add the muscles into a hole in the middle. (Make sure each shell is touching the bottom of the pan) Wait five seconds before mixing.

17) Pour the tomato sauce on the food surrounding the muscles.

18) Mix fifteen times and then push all of the ingredients in the pan to the edge and pour the water on top.

19) Place the bay leaves on top.

20) Sprinkle some saffron on top and mix ten times.

21) Make a thick line down the middle of the pan by pushing all of the ingredients in the pan to the edges on the left and the right sides.

22) Carefully place the prawns down the middle of the pan making sure each one is touching the bottom of the pan.

23) Wait ten seconds and then flip each one over.

24) Wait another ten seconds before mixing ten times.

25) Again, make a large hole in the center of the pan

26) Put one handful of rice in the middle for each person and one extra by sprinkling it from as high as you can reach and let it fall down like rain into the hole.

27) Cook the rice for one minute while making sure it is not sticking to the bottom of the pan.

28) Cover it in green peas.

29) Add one liter of warm water and one one half liter of fish broth. (The liquid should cover every grain of rice).

30) Cook the rice for 15 to 18 minutes making sure there is a hole in the middle.

31) Keep rotating the pan every 5 minutes.

32) Before serving, decorate the almost finished product with lemons and spices.

33) The last step of the recipe is my favorite!…  Eat it all up!  Yum!

The recipe can take a while to make but is so delicious.

We all had a great time cooking together and of course – eating together!