Paella Pan - Worth the Investment

I love my paella pan. It might sound like a strange extraneous piece of kitchen equipment, but believe me, it's worth the money. I use mine all the time. Occasionally, I even make paella in it!

Because I usually cook for one, I tend to use this pan to make all-in-one dishes like fish, vegetables and perhaps polenta. A paella pan is perfect for this because you can cook it all together and only dirty one, if rather large, pan. It also has a lid, which makes it perfect for sauteing and for making dishes with sauces.

The other night, I actually used it for its intended purpose: paella. If you've never made paella, you should. It's really easy and if you make it and you control what's in it, it can also be healthy.

I threw this together the other night because I was hungry, didn't have a lot of ingredients, or patience, and it came out great. There's no exact rules for paella, but here are some basic guidelines:

I used the Seafood Medley from Trader Joe's. It has shrimp, calamari, and bay scallops. You can use any shellfish or other fish too. Mussels are cool because they make it look pretty, but I didn't have any on hand.

Just saute the shellfish from frozen (if necessary) in a spray of olive oil. At the same time, add about 3 cloves of garlic and 1/2 to a whole onion (depending on preference). Next, and this is so easy, it should be illegal: dump in a large can of diced tomatoes (the big fat can) with the juice and everything. Then dump in 1/2 cup uncooked brown medium-grain rice (long-grain won't work). Add about 1/2 to 3/4 cup wine or cooking wine or broth (I like using wine) but you could just use water. This isn't strictly necessary, but I wouldn't make a paella without it: add a sprinkling of saffron. It gives a rich color and an aromatic taste that is unmistakably paella. Without this, I think, it's just another rice dish (although probably a reasonably tasty one). Now you can add any vegetables you like. I added some frozen artichokes and a yellow pepper, but experiment away. Pop the lid on the pan, turn it down to medium and let it simmer away for about 30 minutes or until the liquid has evaporated and the rice is cooked. You do want to check for burning (and add more liquid if necessary) but you don't want to stir it too much because a good paella has a crust on the bottom where the rice has almost stuck to the pan.

This is a great dish to impress your friends with. You don't have to tell them how easy it is. Just act like you've been slaving over it all day and add some fresh chopped parsley to it a few minutes before you take it off the stove. You also don't have to tell them it's good for them.