Paella Party

Ann had wanted me to make a paella for her 60th birthday, but we just could not get large enough group together for such an event at that time. We instead went to Walla Walla wine country to celebrate her birthday and postponed the paella party until the end of October. My large paellera makes enough rice to feed a good 16 people, so it's overkill to make a paella for a small group. Besides, more people is more fun.

Paella Mixta

At its heart, paella is very simple: short-grained rice cooked in broth in a wide, open pan. And thus it depends primarily on two things: the quality of the rice and the quality of the stock used in cooking that rice. I started the day before in making a couple gallons of stock in our big stock pot. For paella, I make stock that complements the garnishes in the paella. So, for example, if I am making a traditional Valencian rabbit paella, I would use rabbit stock. In this case, I wanted to make a paella mixta with chicken, chorizo, and shrimp, so I made a mixed stock.

Starting the Stock; Eight Hours Yet to Cook

In my restaurant days, we would have lots of things laying around for making stock (and sometimes purposefully intended for stock). At home, I start by raiding my freezer in which I collect various bits intended for later use. In this case, I found a whole pork upper shank that I had been saving as well as a bag of trim from frenching a pork rack. Whenever I french a rack by totally denuding the rib bones for presentation purposes, the trim either ends up ground for sausage or other charcuterie or it ends up in the stock pot.

To the pork hock and the rib trim, I added a bunch of pork neck bones, sliced pig's feet, chicken wing tips (from prepping the chicken wings for the paella), shrimp shells (from prepping the shrimp for the paella), a bundle of parsley stems, carrots, celery, saffron, and garlic cloves and peels. Then I added a quart each of chicken stock and clam juice and topped the pot off with water and onto the stove it went to gently simmer for about eight hours, until the giant pork hock was fully cook and fall-apart tender.

When the stock was done, I separated the solids from the broth, mainly in an effort to get the stock as cool as possible as quickly as possible. Nobody wants a foodborne illness from warm stock sitting around growing bacteria. I lightly salted the stock before putting it away. When making paella, I find it easier to control the salt by pre-salting the stock lightly (it will reduce and concentrate the salt) than by trying to guess how much salt to add to the paellera.

At the point when I could bear to put my hands on the hot solids, I picked and reserved all the useable meat. Truth be told, I made more stock than I needed to have leftovers for a great pot of soup, which I did in fact make later in the weekend using the leftover pork meat. You can almost never have too much stock on hand and if you do, you can always cook it down to glace or demiglace and freeze it.

Appetizers: Meatballs in Romesco, Marcona Almonds, and Olives

Despite there being enough paella to feed a small army, Ann and I thought that we should provide some appetizers for our guests that they could munch while I was outside on the patio cooking. The morning of the paella, I made a batch of pork meatballs (pork, parsley, garlic, oregano, basil, and red wine) and that afternoon, I braised them in a big batch of romesco (roasted red peppers, garlic, almonds, white bread, sherry vinegar, and olive oil). These we set out with Marcona almonds (the best!) and some green olives. Simple, but tasty.

Paella Mise en Place from lower left: Vegetables (Piquillos, Onion, Poblano),
Rice, Olive Oil, Chicken Wings, Lima Beans, Shrimp, Salt, Diced Hard Chorizo,
Mix of Parsley/Garlic, and Mix of Pimentón/Saffron

Just before our guests arrived, I lit the fire outside and put out my mise en place for the paella with no fear of lack of refrigeration: it was only about 40 degrees outside and the sun was sinking fast. It would be in the low 20s by morning. The ingredients that I use in my paella vary each time and are certainly non-traditional. I started by learning how to make traditional paella valenciana and now I make my own to suit my mood. I feel lucky not to be bound by the strictures of custom and family pressure to make paella just so.

Preheating the Paellera

Everyone who saw my steel paellera (I love this 55cm Pata Negra from Garcima in Spain) heating on the fire pit on our patio mentioned how perfectly the pan fit on the fire pit. Actually, it was the other way around. I have never cooked a paella on gas before, always lighting a wood fire in the back yard. In our new home in Bend, we have no back yard or really any yard (a plus for travelling), just a patio in the courtyard of our house. And lighting a real fire on our patio wouldn't be all that awesome: we get enough smoke in the house during wildfire season. So, we actually measured the tripod on which the paellera stands and bought a round fire pit that would accommodate it. How is that for planning?

I'm going to say now that I did not make my best paella over the gas. I need more practice to get the perfect soccarat, the crust on the bottom, which I scorched a bit this time. Counterintuitively, I feel like I had better control using a wood fire that I could adjust by moving wood in or out as necessary. I will say that the wind guard around the fire pit really helped with a more even flame. Although I did have to rotate the paellera a bit during cooking, I didn't have to be constantly fiddling with it as I have in the past over a wood fire with an uncontrolled breeze.

Step 1: Brown the Chicken Wings

Steps 2 and 3: Sauté the Vegetables, Then Add the
Pimentón, Saffron, Garlic, and Parsley

Step 4: Add the Stock and Bring to a Mild Boil

Step 5: Add the Rice

Step 6: Add the Shrimp and Lima Beans

Here, you see the cooking paella with all its garnishes (notice how low the flame is now compared to the previous photos), the last to go on the dish are the garnishes that take the least amount of time to cook, the shrimp and the butterbeans/lima beans. The beans are a nod to traditional paella valenciana to which many would add a white bean called the garrofó, or another white bean, or even flat green beans that resemble our romano beans. I'm pretty sure that a traditionalist would cast an evil eye upon these alien beans while silently acknowledging that they taste pretty good in a paella.

Artsy Shot: Flames Glowing Beneath the Paellera

It was well and truly dark by the time the paella finished, at which point, we all migrated into the kitchen where I covered the paella with a towel and let it rest for ten minutes before serving. All eight of us (Ann and I, Rob and Dyce, Andreas and Michelle, and Mark and Kelly) gathered around the big island in the kitchen and dug in to the appetizers and the paella, with lots of red wine poured all around. To finish off the evening's meal, Rob made a delicious apple and green chile pie, with green chiles from Socorro NM that they purchased on their last trip to Santa Fe where they used to live prior to moving to Bend a year ago.

Rob Made This Outstanding New Mexican Apple-Green Chile Pie
Served with Vanilla Ice Cream

We had a great time. I only wish that I hadn't been so busy cooking because I would have liked to have been a bit more present with our guests and to have had the presence of mind to have taken people photographs. This post seems way more clinical than I had wanted for lack of photos of the socializing that took place all evening. Now that the paella is out of the way and it's too dark too early to make a paella until next spring, I'll revert to dishes that do not take active cooking so that I can relax and socialize.

A Fish out of Water

We're all creatures of habit for the most part, aren't we?

I know I am. When I get in the kitchen, I expect things to be in a certain location and when they are not, it throws my game off.

Off my game is how I felt the first time trying to cook in our new kitchen, a fish out of water.

A simple case in point: in our last two kitchens, the knives lived in a knife block on the counter next to the cutting board, easily within reach when needed. Trying to declutter our new island, I purchased an in-drawer knife block that lives in the righthand island drawer. After years of reaching for knives on top of the counter, now they're hidden away in a drawer, neither good nor bad, just different, a confounding of muscle memory.

And so it went while cooking in the new kitchen for the first time last week. Things were not where my body thought they ought to be based on muscle memory, despite when designing the kitchen, my visualizing the new location of the items that we most often use. Visualization is part and parcel of my being: every night at the restaurant, when I was actively cooking as opposed to expediting, I would cook (my part of) each dish in my head while standing at my station, ensuring that each tool and ingredient was exactly where I expected it. Efficiency is, after all, born of familiarity and organization.

Despite all the time that I spent visualizing where things would go in the new kitchen, that did not mean that I had considered everything, or that everything would fit where I thought it should go, or even that my body would automatically reach for something where it was hiding. Cooking the first meal in this kitchen reminded me of cooking as a guest chef in somebody else's restaurant. I would always feel a bit helpless in not knowing where anything was. I'm sure if you've ever cooked at somebody else's house, you can relate.

Though it was awkward reaching for the salt, a tasting spoon, or a towel and not finding it right away, it was still a blast to finally cook a meal after a month and a half with no kitchen, even if I had no clue how to work the stove controls. It won't take long to build new habits and muscle memory in our new kitchen and I am looking forward to no longer feeling like a fish on dry land.

Arugula, Tomatoes, Goat Cheese, and Marcona Almonds
with Tomato-Hazelnut Vinaigrette

Pasta with Chicken Confit and Sugar Snaps in Garlic-Thyme Cream;
Crispy Chicken Skin

Brebirousse d'Argental Cheese with Persimmons,
Chipotle-Tangerine Marmalade, and Rosemary Caramel

Curried Chicken Breast Salad

Curried Chicken Breast Salad

Chicken breast is not really my thing, but Ann really likes it a lot. Because of this, recently, rather than buying just thighs, I've taken to buying a whole chicken each week to ten days and using it for at least three meals. I'll start by using the breasts for a dish, then poach the carcass. I'll then pick the meat from the carcass and use it for one dish (such as chicken tinga or chicken and black bean tacos) while the stock contributes to a soup of some sort. 

Ann really likes chicken breast on salad, so I made this one for her, a super quick and easy meal if ever there were one. I start by taking the breasts off the chicken and while they cook over medium heat in a skillet, I assemble the salad.

For this particular salad, I coated the slightly flattened chicken breasts in Madras curry powder. For Indian dishes, I always put together specific masalas from individual spices just for the dish. But for American dishes, I like the convenience of a decent pre-mixed curry powder. After the spice-rubbed breasts sat for a few minutes, I filmed a large skillet with the barest amount of oil and cooked them slowly over moderate heat until just done. These big breasts (off a 5-pound bird) took every bit of ten minutes to cook, with a turn about seven minutes in. The moderate heat keeps my smoke detector from going off and keeps the breasts moist.

I made a quick dressing of a spoonful of unflavored yogurt, a squeeze of agave nectar, a dribble of rice vinegar, a pinch of salt, and a half a teaspoon of curry powder. After mixing it well, I thinned it with water to the consistency I wanted and rechecked the seasonings.

This salad is a mix of whatever greens I had on hand (spinach, arugula, and romaine, I think), diced Granny Smith apple, Marcona almonds, and golden raisins (only in my salad; Ann doesn't do raisins). Good, easy, relatively low fat, low carb, and plenty of fiber. Hard to beat a dish like this for a quick weeknight dinner.

I feel quite fortunate that our local grocery sells bulk Marcona almonds at about $15 per pound. I can get a quarter cup for about a dollar or so and not have to commit serious coin to buy this extravagance. If you've never had Marconas, the Cadillacs of almonds, you should give them a try. But don't blame me if you don't ever want to eat any other kind of almond again.

Simple Trail Mix Recipe

As a chef, it always concerns me when people buy simple foods that they could make for pennies on the dollar, foods such as trail mix. As a hiker, it often amuses me what passes for commercial trail mix. Clearly some people making trail mix have never considered what happens to chocolate when it gets warm.

Simple 6-Ingredient Trail Mix

Trail mix is not necessarily about being healthy; it's about providing fuel that is part instantaneous and part long-term to keep you going on the trail. If you've ever bonked after three or four miles of tough trail because of insufficient fuel, you know exactly what I'm talking about. The following recipe delivers simple sugars and carbs, complex carbs (bonus: plenty of fiber), and lots of salt to keep you going. It's not what your cardiologist or dietician will recommend, but when you're burning 4-5000 calories on a hike, you need lots of easy-to-ingest fuel.

Here's a really simple 6-item trail mix recipe that takes just a few minutes of active work and can be prepared from ingredients readily found in your grocery store.

Simple Six-Ingredient Trail Mix Recipe

4 cups/12 ounces high quality rolled oats (that is, not Quaker and not steel cut)
2 cups/7 ounces slivered almonds
1/2 cup/4 fluid ounces amber (grade B) maple syrup
2 teaspoons Kosher salt
2 cups/8 ounces dried sweetened cranberries (or other fruit of your choice)
2 cups/11 ounces peanut M&Ms

Yield: 2-1/2 pounds trail mix

You'll need a half sheet tray or other rimmed cookie sheet, preferably with a silicone mat to keep clean up a breeze. And you'll need a big bowl to mix everything in.

Start by preheating your oven to about 350F. In a large bowl, mix the oats, almonds, maple syrup, and salt. This quantity of salt will make it taste very salty. When you're out on the trail sweating away, you're going to want this salt. You'll crave it with every fiber in your being. Trust me on this. Too salty when you're not exercising is just right.

Spread the oat mix on a sheet tray (and silicone mat if you have one) and place it in the oven. It's going to take about 30 minutes to get to a consistent golden brown. The oats will brown from the outside of the pan to the middle, so you want to mix it periodically for even browning. I stir it after 10 minutes, again after 10 more minutes, and finally after 5 more minutes.

Bake to Golden Brown, About 30 Minutes

Remove from the oven once it is evenly golden brown and let cool thoroughly, at least 30 minutes and preferably longer. You want all the remaining moisture to evaporate so that mold is not an issue. Pour the oats, cranberries, and M&Ms into a gallon seal-top bag, seal it with plenty of air space inside, and shuffle it about in your hands to mix the contents well.

Lay the bag flat, press out all the excess air, and re-seal for storage. Ann and I repackage it into smaller bags for each hike.

A word or two on ingredients:

Oats. If you don't already know, Quaker rolled oats suck. (Indra Nooyi, call me. I'll tell you just how bad.) High dollar steel cut oats have to be cooked to be edible. Buy the best quality rolled oats you can find. I get mine in bulk from my dry goods supplier.

Maple Syrup. Chefs and pastry chefs use grade B and leave grade A for the tourists. Grade B is cheaper, darker, and more flavorful. Mine comes from Highland County, Virginia.

Salt. It's always Morton's Kosher for me and my restaurant kitchen. Always reliable. If you use another salt with a different crystal size, you may have to adjust the quantity of salt in the recipe.

Peanut M&Ms. I rarely ever use pre-prepared foods. I want really salty peanuts and chocolate in my trail mix. If you've ever rolled your own with chunks of chocolate, you know why Mars has made a fortune telling you "melts in your mouth and not in your hands." Just don't turn the bag over and read the ingredients. Be bad. You're burning a ton of calories on the trail.

Every Day is Special

I bought some of the first baby arugula of the winter at the farmers market on Saturday and started to build a Sunday dinner around those beautiful salad greens. But Sunday afternoon after we had a huge and unanticipated steak lunch, we decided to forgo dinner in favor of local goat cheese and Ann's delicious roasted garlic bread. Her bread is so good—and this loaf in particular was so good—that we always gorge on it, leaving no room for anything else. I just want to say here that I have no need to bake bread any longer; my girl does an outstanding job! And so we left the arugula for Monday night.

I got home early on Monday: I worked on year-end closing paperwork until I was fed up and I fled the restaurant to spend some quality time with Ann. Early evening after we wrestled with insurance policies and other family stuff that we just couldn't put off to another day, Ann went down to basement to get a bottle of wine. She wanted to surprise me with her choice, but the cork broke as she was opening the bottle and I hopped up to help her get it out and filter the wine. Broken and crumbling corks are a fact of life with older wines.

1997 Linden Red Reserve

And so I saw the wine label before she poured me a glass of this beautiful 1997 Linden Red Reserve (which we tasted last weekend at the Linden Library Tasting). Jim Law gave us this bottle as a wedding present and we had been saving it for a special occasion. I was a little surprised that Ann chose this bottle, but I always tell her that any time you open a special bottle, it is a special occasion. And she was so happy that I got home early yesterday that she wanted to celebrate.

I spent 90 minutes over two glasses of wine, enjoying each tiny sip like it might be my last. And it probably will be my last of this delicious wine. This bottle tasted even better than the bottle that Jim opened at the library tasting and that was my favorite wine of the day. Really delicious.

Arugula, Tomatoes, Goat Cheese, Almonds and Tomato Vinaigrette

On to dinner, we tossed the baby arugula with halved grape tomatoes, toasted almonds, local fresh goat cheese, and tomato vinaigrette. The salad was so fabulous (it's been months since we last had amazing salad greens) that I am still thinking about how much I enjoyed it today. I love a good salad and good salads seem to be few and far between.

Strozzapreti with Porcini, Pancetta, and Broccoli

And for our main course, Ann and I made a porcini sauce by cooking up some of the pancetta that I cure with minced garlic and rosemary from the garden. To this, we added rehydrated porcini mushrooms and a splash of heavy cream. The tiny broccoli florets (side shoots that grow after the main crown has been cut) from a local farm went into the water with the strozzapreti for the final minute and then everything was tossed with some grated pecorino. The local winter broccoli is so sweet and delicious this year!

Sitting down to a rare meal at the table with Ann and Carter and enjoying delicious local food with a very wonderful and rare bottle of wine made me remember that days like this are more special and worthy of celebration than almost any other!

Tapas and Paella with Don and Terry

Wow! Wow! Wow!

That's all I have to say after visiting friends Donald and Terry on Sunday: "Wow!"


Ann and Donald with a bottle of Glen Manor Hodder Hill 2009, the wine that just won the Governor's Cup as the best wine in the state. Damn good it is too!

Carter and his mother in one of Carter's calmer moments, a rarity these days.

Check out the tapas spread the guys had awaiting us!


White bread cut-outs with olive oil, cheese, and smoked salt—addictive!

Asparagus frittata. It's pretty cool how the asparagus float in the eggs and separate themselves.

Dates stuffed with Manchego and walnuts.

Olives, walnuts in hickory salt, and Marcona almonds. The olives were my favorite. I can live on olives.

Mushrooms stuffed with corn, chorizo, and cream cheese. Yum!


We started our tapas with the 2009 Amalie Robert Pinot Meunier that I brought and what a neat wine this is! Intense fruit and excellent acidity in such a light-bodied wine. I am not sure that I could tell this from Pinot Noir if tasting blind. And then Terry surprised us by opening a bottle of 2010 Borsao Garnacha "Tres Picos." I know Borsao from the restaurant where we have carried their wines at times over the years. Still I was not prepared for this full-on modern-style prestige Garnacha with its huge fruit and lavish oak regimen. A fun wine for drinking with friends!


After many tapas, much wine, and a lot of catching up, we got around to dinner itself, starting with a fantastic salad of arugula, marinated melon, jamón serrano, and curls of Manchego.

The pièce de résistance was the paella and what cojones Terry has to attempt his first paella ever with a chef in the house! Here is the fabulous concoction both before and after cooking. It was notable for me because Terry used Valencia rice, which I have never had before. I make my paella at the restaurant from either Bomba or Arborio depending on what I have on hand. The tiny little Valencia grains were fantastic.



The guys would never let us leave without an overload of dessert, including a membrillo and pine nut tart, chocolate dipped apricots, strawberries, and grapes.


Just look at this tart! It was as delicious as it looks good.


Naturally, one must have a piece of chocolate for that last swallow of red wine.

And finally, I had to finish with this shot of the grapes just because I like it so much. I guess if you click the shutter long enough, you're bound to take a good photo every once in a while.