Description[]
This recipe is from Yotam Ottolenghi's vegetarian cookbook "Plenty". It was published in guardian.co.uk
- Serves two generously.
Ingredients[]
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- ½ Spanish onion, finely chopped
- 1 small red and 1 small yellow pepper, cut into strips
- ½ fennel bulb, cut into strips
- 2 garlic cloves, crushed
- 2 bay leaves
- ¼ tsp smoked paprika
- ½ tsp ground turmeric
- ¼ tsp cayenne pepper
- 150 g calasparra (or other paella) rice
- 100 ml good-quality medium sherry
- 1 tsp saffron threads
- 450 ml boiling vegetable stock
- salt
- 200 g shelled broad beans (fresh or frozen)
- 12 mini plum tomatoes, halved
- 5 small grilled artichokes in oil (from a jar), drained and quartered
- 15 pitted kalamata olives, crushed
- 2 tbsp roughly chopped parsley
- 4 lemon wedges
Directions[]
- Heat the oil in a paella pan or a large shallow frying pan, then gently fry the onion for five minutes.
- Add the peppers and fennel, and fry on a medium heat for six minutes, until soft and golden.
- Add the garlic and cook for a further minute.
- Add the bay, paprika, turmeric and cayenne, stir, then add the rice and stir thoroughly for two minutes before adding the sherry and saffron.
- Boil down for a minute, then add the stock and a third of a teaspoon of salt.
- Turn the heat as low as it will go and simmer very gently for about 20 minutes, until most of the liquid has been absorbed by the rice.
- Do not cover the pan or stir the rice during this time.
- Meanwhile, put the broad beans in a bowl, cover with plenty of boiling water, leave for a minute, drain and set aside to cool.
- Once cool enough to handle, squeeze each bean gently to remove its papery skin.
- Remove the paella pan from the heat.
- Taste, add more salt if needed, but without stirring the rice much.
- Scatter the tomatoes, artichokes and broad beans over the rice, cover the pan tightly with foil and leave to rest for 10 minutes.
- Take off the foil.
- Scatter the olives and parsley over the top of the paella and serve with lemon wedges.