Ersatz Paella

What do you make when you want a paella, but don't have all the ingredients you need and are in no mood to go get them? You make fake paella, of course. Or at least I do. This isn't that fake, except I have a big sautoir standing in for a paellera and achiote paste standing in for saffron. The sautoir didn't make too much difference, but the achiote, well, let's just call this arroz amarillo and say that I missed the saffron. The color and flavor are all wrong.

I started by cooking the chorizos in the sautoir and then dredging some chicken wings in pimentón and cooking them most of the way through after removing the chorizos. After removing the chorizos to a platter, I cooked yellow onion, orange bell pepper, and garlic in the pan, then I added the achiote paste and the rice. Once the rice was cooked in the oil, I added some tomatoes and their juice, the chicken, and the chorizos to the pan and added water to just cover.

Aren't these Salvadoran chorizos cute?

About 16 or 17 minutes later, I scattered green onions and mussels on top and turned the flame up high to create a crusty socarrat on the bottom of the pan. A thin paellera would have created a better crust than the big aluminum sautoir.

We started the afternoon with this Ginger Grapefruit Cocktail made with ginger simple syrup, pink grapefruit juice, and Absolut Citron. Ann made the simple syrup by putting two cups of warm simple syrup on about a cup of chopped ginger, blitzing everything in the blender, letting it stand overnight, and straining through a very fine chinois.

Ginger Grapefruit Cocktail

1 1/2 parts ginger syrup
1 1/2 parts Absolut citron
4 parts pink grapefruit juice

Shake with ice and strain; serve up.




Ann seemed to enjoy the cocktails, but they weren't my thing. I'm not a big cocktail or liquor guy. Hey, we can't agree on absolutely everything! So, I opened a bottle of Roessler Pinot Noir "Savoy" Anderson Valley 2006. I find that the only Pinots from California that I really like are those from the Sonoma Coast north like this one from Mendocino. Still, it was too ripe for my liking. Hey California, less ripe, more acid, please! More finesse, guys; less sledgehammer!