Recipe for Spanish Seafood Paella

This recipe for spanish seafood paella is quite authentic - you will need twice the volume of fluid as rice - any juices that you get from preparing the ingredients should be reserved and water used to make up the difference.

Recipe for Spanish Seafood Paella
1 small chicken
dry white wine
2 pints (1.1litres) mussels - scrubbed and bearded
1 small cooked lobster
1 squid - either rings or small whole squid
Olive oil for frying
1 red pepper - deseeded and diced
1 green pepper - deseeded and diced
1 large onion - peeled and chopped
2 cloves garlic - peeled and crushed
1lb (500g) long grain rice
Saffron strands
8 oz (250g) frozen peas

Cut the chicken into pieces and poach in about 5 fl oz (150ml) wine for 25 minutes until cooked through. Skin and cut into small pieces and reserve the stock.

Put 2 tbspns wine into a large frying pan and add the mussels - steam until open, then remove from the pan and leave to one side. Discard any that haven't opened and reserve the cooking liqour.

Cut the lobster into bite sized pieces and set to one side.

Fry the squid quickly in a little olive oil, drain and set aside.

Heat 2 tbspns olive oil in a large paella or frying pan. Add the peppers, onion and garlic and fry for 1 minute. Add the rice and coat in the oil. Pour in your fluid - twice the volume of rice made up out of the reserved cooking liquors and water.

Bring to simmering point and then add your saffron - stir well.

Now's the hard bit - cover (either with a lid or foil) and leave it for 10 minutes - no peeping as the cooking time will be extended and you might get grains of rice that are not cooked in the finished dish - so LEAVE IT ALONE.

Add the cooked chicken and seafood, stir well and cover - leave to cook for about 5 minutes.

Then add the peas, stir well, cover and leave a further 5 minutes.

All should be cooked perfectly if you have got the volume of fluid to rice balanced.

This recipe for spanish seafood paella is very versatile - you can use large dublin bay prawns, crayfish, clams - any mixture of shellfish you prefer.

When you weigh your rice for this recipe for spanish seafood paella, it is a good idea to then put it into a measuring jug to see exactly what volume it is - then it is a simple job to double up the volume of fluid.

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