With 20% off Spain in January and February, I thought why get a good paella recipe up and pair it with a few great value wines. For best results, use real chicken stock here. It’s a handy recipe you’re bound to use again and again.
Ingredients
25g butter
1 tbsp olive oil
8 free range chicken thighs, skinned
1 medium onion
2 cloves of garlic
225g of long grain rice
1 tsp saffron strands
1 pint of warm chicken stock
1 bay leaf
225g frozen peas
1 red pepper, seeded & diced
2 tomatoes, quartered
100g peeled prawns
100g shelled mussels
8 unpeeled prawn
lemon wedges to garnish
Method
Heat the butter and oil in a large frying pan or paella dish. Add the chicken and fry until lightly browned. Remove and set aside. Fry the onion and garlic until golden and then add the rice and cook for a minute, stirring. Return the chicken to the pan with the saffron, stock and bay leaf. Bring to the boil, cover and simmer gently for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally and adding more stock if necessary. Stir in the vegetables, heat for a few minutes and remove the lid, adding the mussels and prawns to heat through. Serve up with lemon wedges and a nice bottle of Spanish white!
The wine match
In my previous post I said that Spain is doing inexpensive wines well. As an example the Mont Marcal Blanco made its own way into our top 10 whites last year without us really having to push it. The feedback has been terrific. It would be a lovely little everyday wine to pair with Paella.
I’ll stay with white because I do think it goes better with this dish, although if you do go for red probably the lighter unoaked Spaniards (San Pedro Rioja) would work best. Pazo de Monterray Godello or the Valdamor Albarino are my two mid-range choices. Outside of Spain, but staying with the Spanish varietals, Bleasdale’s Pott’s Catch Verdelho has been earning great praise recently. A touch of savouriness will work well here.
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