"PAELLA" - Cuban Style !!!

[ez2cdave]

PAELLA - Cuban Style !!!




   Three Guys Paella Cubana - Cuban Style Paella

   By Three Guys From Miami

   http://icuban.com/food/paella_cubana.html

   Prep time: 25 minutes
   Cook time: 1 hour
   Total time: 1 hour 25 minutes
   Yield: 8 servings

   The Three Guy's Cuban version of this classic rice dish guarantees seafood in every bite.

   INGREDIENTS:

   1/2 cup olive oil (more or less)
   1 cup diced ham
   1 cup chorizo sausage, sliced into 1/2 inch pieces
   2 1/2 cups onion, diced
   1 1/2 cups green bell pepper, chopped
   1 1/2 cups red bell pepper, chopped
   6 cloves garlic, minced
   3 1/2 cups parboiled rice
   4 cups chicken broth
   3/4 cup red wine
   Dash of Bijol powder
   4 cans smoked clams or oysters with oil
   2 teaspoons salt
   2 pounds large raw shrimp, peeled and de-veined
   1 1/2 pound scallops
   1/2 pound crabmeat, frozen leg sections cut in pieces
   4-8 medium lobster tails, meat removed from shell and cut in bite-size pieces
   8 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
   1 red or green bell pepper sliced and used as a garnish
   1 cup green peas frozen
   12 fresh clams or mussels in the shell (optional)

   Heat the olive oil in a LARGE pan. Sauté the ham and chorizo sausage (Use only Spanish chorizo!) This will draw the oil from the chorizo and flavor the pan. Remove chorizo and ham and set aside.

   Drop the onion, green pepper, and red pepper in the remaining oil and cook until the onions are translucent. Add garlic and sauté briefly. In a large covered pot, add the broth, wine, smoked clams/oysters, onion/pepper mixture and Bijol powder.

   Fry chicken pieces in the remaining oil, until browned on both sides. Remove chicken and set aside.

   Add the chicken, ham, chorizo, and rice to your pot. You should now have everything in the pot EXCEPT the shrimp, lobster, scallops, and crab meat. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, cover and simmer on the stove for 30 to 40 minutes, until the rice is fully cooked. (The rice should be a little wet, but not soupy at this point.)

   While the rice is cooking, you need to sauté all of the seafood. It's important that the olive oil be "seasoned" with the chorizo, so sauté a few additional chorizo links as needed to give your oil a distinct pink appearance. Sauté the seafood in small batches. Don't overcrowd the pan!

   Carefully remove the lobster meat from the tails, keeping the shells whole so that we can use them for a garnish. We also like to cut up the lobster meat to give everyone a chance at tasting this delicious treat!

   When sautéing the seafood, you want to undercook it just a bit. Shrimp and lobster will be pink; scallops will become white and less translucent. Crab meat is usually pre-cooked, so a quick turn in the chorizo flavored oil is all that's necessary to give it that extra flavor. Remove each batch as you go and keep the seafood covered and warm so that it does not dry out.

   If you have fresh clams and/or mussels, now is a good time to steam them in a little water and wine until they open. We like to use a New Zealand greenshell mussel, which comes precooked and frozen on the half shell. We simply steam them in a covered saucepan just until heated through.

   OK, the rice mixture is now completely cooked and all of the seafood has been sautéed.

   Now gently fold the seafood into the rice mixture. Then spoon everything into a round flat pan suitable for serving. (We like to use a brown cazuela, a round terra cotta dish that makes a nice presentation.) Garnish the top of the dish with crab leg sections, frozen green peas, lobster tail shells, slices of green or red bell pepper, clams, and mussels (in the shell.)

   Once you've assembled the paella in the cazuela, place the dish in a preheated 350ºF oven for five minutes only, just long enough to meld the flavors and heat through. Do not overcook!

   You can make this a day ahead!

   We frequently make this dish a day ahead, it actually tastes better the second day! Simply cover tightly with aluminum foil and refrigerate overnight. The next day, heat in the oven at 350º F covered with foil (to prevent the rice on top from drying out) for about 30 minutes to one hour. Check the dish frequently when re-heating! You just want the dish heated through, not overcooked, which will ruin the seafood. Remove the foil during the last fifteen minutes of re-heating.

[Alto Mare]

Thanks for sharing Dave, I will give it a try. Yes, I could see it being better the next day.
At my house, I'm the only one that prefers frozen peas, they rather have that mushy stuff from the can .

Sal

[Dominick]

Dave I will give that recipe a try one of these days.  Here is a photo of Spanish Paella I cooked.  That is granddaughter Sophie and Jackie a member of our extended family.  Dominick

[newfuturevintage]

Man, Dominick, that looks stunning. 

Will have to give the Cuban one a try, it sounds great.  This is my go-to dish, so I doubly appreciate the post! 

Timely too: I just made one yesterday of squid ink, olives, garlic, and swai fillets, and unusually for me, lentils.  This was the "Clean out the fridge" version.  Worked out very nicely.

one tip: where they're calling out parboiled rice, do yourself the favor and use bomba rice if you can find it, or dacsa's Valenciano rice is a good (and much cheaper) substitute.  Oh, and fry it a little in the oil before adding the broth. 

[steelfish]

Dom,

thats not a paella, its a pan filled with sea food, meat and chicken and few rice here and there.

my paella looks  nothing compared with yours, mine is rice and few chicken, few sea food and few meat here and there  (sorry no pics)
looks stunning a delicious

[Dominick]

Dom,

thats not a paella, its a pan filled with sea food, meat and chicken and few rice here and there.

my paella looks  nothing compared with yours, mine is rice and few chicken, few sea food and few meat here and there  (sorry no pics)
looks stunning a delicious

Yup!!  The dish was made with my own recipe.  What this means is I read many recipes to understand how the dish should come out.  Then I take the best of all the recipes and make it mine.  I basically use calamari, shrimp, clams, mussels, pork, chicken, onion, garlic, saffron, red and green peppers, chicken broth, rice and lots of love.  Dominick

[Big Tim]

Dave I will give that recipe a try one of these days.  Here is a photo of Spanish Paella I cooked.  That is granddaughter Sophie and Jackie a member of our extended family.  Dominick

If you start that dish now it will be ready by time I show up  Stunning

[Dominick]

You know what Tim?  I checked the date of the photo.  I haven't made this dish since 2008.  Our 25th wedding anniversary is coming up on the Fourth of July I might make for a party.  Dominick

[ez2cdave]

All of this is making me hungry . . . LOL !

Tight Lines !

[Alto Mare]

That's one heck of a presentation Dominick.
I remember my Dad used to wake me up at 4:00 am to help him make necklaces out of night crawlers, I was 6 at the time.
He promised he would get me a bike, but I never got one .

We use to get crayfish by the dozens and never took them home, he used to sell them .

Great job on that Paella, buddy!

[Rancanfish]

Whuuut? A necklace out of night crawlers?

Looks good Dom.

My parents completely forgot my 12th birthday Sal.   

[thorhammer]

Dave I will give that recipe a try one of these days.  Here is a photo of Spanish Paella I cooked.  That is granddaughter Sophie and Jackie a member of our extended family.  Dominick

thats just amazing

[Reel 224]

Dominick: You are an Artiest with food! Great looking dish

[Tiddlerbasher]

Dominick - what no pimenton

[newfuturevintage]

Dominick - what no pimenton