Valencian Paella cooking class
- seanick9
- Jun 15
- 5 min read
My First Paella cooking class - traditional Valencian Paella
Today, I attended a Paella cooking workshop hosted by My First Paella. We met in front of a church in the neighborhood of Russafa, and apparently for a good reason - this particular neighborhood and maybe even particular street is where the dish is believed to have originated.
The ingredients we picked up at Mercat de Russafa - the guide Valentino showed us around the market, explained a bit of the history of the neighborhood - Why it is named “Russafa” (it used to be rice fields, and poor, rather than built up as part of the city, and Ruzafa is Arabic for Garden, since that’s what it was in the Moorish period). We walked through the market, and the guides told us about what ingredients make up each of the traditional Paella styles, what the name Paella means (literally, just pan, as in frying pan), that it’s traditionally cooked on Sunday, and more.
After our tour of walking through the Mercat, picking up a few bags of ingredients and tasting some Easter sausage, we walked back to the establishment in which we would do our cooking. All the while, both in the market and on the walk, the guides were telling us about the Paellas that we would be cooking.
The fish used in Seafood Paella is prawns and cuttlefish (Cuttlefish, instead of other shellfish like scallops, because it holds up better to cooking without becoming tough and rubbery), and the common ingredients in Paella (Tomatoes, round rice, saffron, salt, paprika, and lots of olive oil).
Valencian Paella has rabbit, chicken, and snails. And apparently Spanish folk are very particular about not just WHAT goes into the Paella, but HOW it goes in- if you add extra ingredients, it’s not Paella, it’s just “rice with things”. And if you remove the bones or shells, it’s also just “rice with things”... the shells have to be left on, for it to be considered traditional Paella!
This may seem like pedantry to some, but it’s what I love to hear as a cooking aficionado. I grew up with my dad and uncle telling me that for it to be Cajun, it has to have the Cajun trinity - onion, bell pepper and celery - and if you want to be taken seriously for your food, having a sense for what that food should and should not have in it is important. I appreciated, therefore, this background information and it gave me a better sense for what the vibe of the food itself is.
There were 20 people in the class, and we were split up into three groups depending on what we had signed up for online.
Vegetarian Paella
Seafood Paella
Traditional Valencian paella
We started by making up a couple batches of Sangria, (apparently, traditionally has to be red as it’s named after the blood of Christ), and getting started with some apertivos - Iberico ham, olives, papas bravas, etc., while the hosts organized the ingredients we’d need.
Once properly sauced up, we split into groups and heard the general outline of the cook.
Each cook was different, since the base ingredients were completely different.
The meat dish cooked the chicken and rabbit first, and at relatively high heat in order to render the fat, as that fat was later used to impart flavor into the rest of the ingredients.
For seafood, the cuttlefish played that role, but was not cooked from the beginning - instead, the rice itself was cooked a bit in the oil, and tomatoes, garlic and onion were cooked and then blended to create the initial stock.
And for vegetable Paella, there were a handful more aromatic vegetables added and the stock was essentially clear.
From here, I’ll refer mostly to the Valencia Paella as that was the station I was on. (if you want to see the other recipes, they are also listed at the same site myfirstpaella.es)
After the meat and/or seafood, we fried the butter beans in the oil. We were looking for lightly blistered skin, but kept flipping them regularly to keep any from getting overcooked. Once they were cooked, we pushed the beans to the side of the pan.
Preparing the Saffron: this is where I learned my first new technique - how to properly use Saffron! I’d cooked rice with saffron before, but never really knew how to use it - this time, we used a mortar and pestle, threw in a couple handfuls of kosher salt, and the measured amount of Saffron needed for the dish - grinding it together until the saffron was broken almost completely down and the salt had absorbed most of its color. Then, some of the broth and oil was added to make a seasoning paste. This was pretty interesting and something I’ll try next time I have an opportunity to use Saffron for something!
Once the beans were ready, we pushed the beans to the side along with the chicken, and began to bloom the spices. The host had 4 folk get ready with our 4 different ingredients - Valencian paprika, smoked paprika, minced garlic, and grated roma tomatoes (yes, grated! We grated the flesh and discarded the skin). This went in every 5 seconds starting with the garlic and finishing with the tomato. The chicken and rabbit had left some bits stuck on the bottom of the pan, but the acidity of the tomatoes worked to deglaze.
After deglazing, we sauteed the spices and tomatoes (with the meat and beans all spread to the sides of the pan still) until most of the liquid was boiled off and it began to brown - at which point the stock was added a bit at a time to mix in with the flavors of the oil and spices. We brought the broth to a boil, then added some rosemary sprigs.
This was another new technique! Rosemary can overpower the flavor of a dish, and the point of the Paella is to have a happy balance of flavors, with nothing dominating the palate - so when you add the rosemary, we put them in whole for 5 minutes and then fished them back out, leaving just a hint of the rosemary flavor.
At this point, we made sure the pan was level (it wasn’t, and the pan had to be leveled with some cut pieces of cork before adding the rice to it, since once the rice is in the pan can’t be disturbed.) and added the rice. This is another place where we learned a technique - apparently you can tap the bottom of the pain with a spoon to see if the rice is ready (but only the Valencian style rice!) because the fats of the chicken and rabbit will caramelize the rice on the bottom layer, you won’t hear the spoon tap the metal of the pan if it hits the caramelized rice. So, when you want to see if the rice is cooked through, you use a spoon and listen for a ‘clink’ sound! If you don’t hear it, it’s because it’s done!
We then sat around and enjoyed our creation with another glass of wine. !Salud i forza al canut!
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