Mmmmmmm... Paella!

Nobody ever asks me for recipes, lol, but sometimes I just put them up anyway!

This pic looks the most like my paella, altho I never add green olives.

This is my New Year's traditional meal. All my favorite things to eat heaped on a platter, imbedded in spiced rice. What better way to start the year? There are a bazillion recipes for paella. This is mine.

3-4 Tbsp olive oil
2 lbs of chicken wing drummies, skinned
1 lb peeled & cooked deveined shrimp
1 cup Chinese pea pods, cut diagonally into 1" lengths
1 lb cooked chorizo, (or can use those mini cocktail weinies)
1 lb (1 small bag?) of very baby carrots - not those peeled butt-plug carrots! If that's all you have then cut them lengthways into 1/4s.
1 bunch of green onions, thinly sliced. (White part will be cooked. Reserve green tops for garnish)
1/2 cup red or orange bell pepper, cut in medium dice
1 10 oz can enchilada sauce
1/4 cup sliced black olives
1/2 cup toasted halved cashew nuts for garnish

4 cups aromatic rice (I like jasmine rice & never use the traditional risotto rice)
1-2 medium, perfectly ripe tomatoes, diced & drained
6 cups chicken broth (works for the 4 cups jasmine rice)
pinch of saffron threads (or 1 Tbsp paprika)
1 generous tsp salt

Pre-heat oven to 325'
(artichoke hearts sometimes)
(mushrooms if you're weird that way)

--Put olive oil in a large skillet, heat on medium-high, then add the chicken drummies, toss and cook til they start to sizzle
--Add enough enchilada sauce to roughly coat the drummies and saute them in this sauce. They need to cook about 25 minutes total.
--Add the baby carrots to the chicken about halfway through cooking. Also add a little more enchilada sauce if needed to coat the carrots.
--About four minutes before the chicken would be done, add in the chorizo, diced pepper and white part of the onions, toss, return to saute temp and cover for these last 4 minutes.

While the chicken is cooking, prepare the rice.
--Heat 6 cups chicken broth to boiling in a large, heavy saucepan.
--Add 4 cups of jasmine rice, the saffron threads and 1 tsp of salt.
--Give the rice one quick stir, return to a boil then cover the pan, reduce the heat to medium-low-low and cook until rice has absorbed the broth. (Jasmine rice cooks quickly - maybe 8 minutes?)

Assembling the paella.
--Assemble the paella on an oven-proof platter. A wok works well too. You want to assemble it and finish cooking it in the pan/platter it will be served in.
--Add the black olives, tomatoes and diced pepper to the cooked chicken, carrot & sausage mixture.
--Usually, I spread about 1/3 of the rice across the bottom on the serving platter, then using a large spoon I add about 1/3 of the cooked stuff. Use the spoon to embed the cooked stuff into the rice. Don't stir - just ease it in.
--Repeat layers. Use all the sauce & oil in your saute pan as you mix your rice base with the meat base. It looks really nice if you heap it up as you go, creating a little mountain.
--Add the shrimp on top of everything else. Usually I stick them into the heaped rice at random. Some people like to make a little shrimp pinwheel on top. Whatever.
--Drizzle any remaining saute sauce over the top of your assembled paella. (Sometimes I add more enchilada sauce sraight from the can; depends on if I think the rice looks finished.)
--Cover with foil and place into the pre-heated oven for at least 15 minutes. It can sit longer but after 40 minutes the rice may start to get mushy.
--Just before serving, garnish the top with the sliced green onion tops and toasted cashews.

Yum!

Goes nicely with a very simple salad of mixed greens, red onion and mandarin orange segments.

It's a lot of ingredients but a pretty simple prep, overall. You have one skillet you cook stuff in and one saucepan to cook the rice. Then you put the two preps together on a platter & stick it in the oven. Done.