Paella is not a dilemma

Paella is a native dish of the Valencian community that has become a common dish in festivities and celebrations in the city of Miami. Given its popularity, I wanted to embark on a research trip to the root of this tasty and exquisite dish.

On my trip I understood more than one concept related to the dish itself. First of paella is one of the thousand different ways to cook rice, but it is probably one of the most complex, Well, according to the Valencian poet Josep Piera, paella is rice made in a paella (container and place where the fire is made), the final result of which is a whole grain, dry, loose and tasty, regardless of the ingredients it contains.

Seen this way, authentic paella is very far from what most Cubans call paella, Well, in general, we call this a type of rice with a creamy or honeyed consistency that is cooked with seafood and sometimes with other meat elements that can be chicken, chorizo, pork or mixed and with a brothy or honeyed consistency.

Variants have also emerged such as peasant rice, which is an original rice from Cuba, but which has undergone variations in its original ingredients, sometimes being grotesque and of bad taste. I want to clarify that What we call paella in Cuba is exquisite rice and the peasant rice that is made at Miami festivals is also very tasty, but we should understand that paella is a purely cultural dish, which has achieved international popularity and of which Valencians are very proud, and it is not eaten with ripe plantains, hahaha.

Recently the famous chefs Jose Andres, Spanish, and British Gordon Ramsay They staged a professional fight only because the latter published on his networks a recipe that he called authentic paella and added chorizo. The Spaniard complained to him, asking him to please remove the chorizo from the recipe, since this ingredient is probably the greatest of sins. on this plate. Like these fights, we can find millions of complaints on different social media walls, as is also the case with the chef. Jamie Oliver, also of British origin who suffered the same complaints from other Spanish colleagues.

And it is that Paella is a dish of celebration, tradition and, above all, a dish that deserves the respect of all kitchen professionals. It is an original dish, which is cooked with ingredients from the Valencian region. The rice is harvested in La Albufera, an extensive lake with shallow waters that occupies an immense space just 10 kilometers from Valencia capital; The chicken, the rabbit, the snails, the duck are also from the Albufera, and the vegetables, which can be the garrofon, the rochet and the bachoqueta.

Of course, the region's typical seafood paella is also popular. This does not mean that all the paellas you will find in Valencia are good, much less that those we find outside will be bad, but we must accept that it is a typical dish with special characteristics.

To understand it better, I think we should see it as our congrí, which has also been a topic of discussion for years. It is said that the authentic congrí is the one that is cooked in the eastern region with red beans, and that the one made with black beans is Moro rice, although gastronomic literature recognizes that the congrí is anything that is made with beans and the Most of the time we only accept as congrí the one made with red beans.

In this same way, it is recognized that the paella is the container in which the rice is cooked and that what is cooked in it is paella, but the authentic one is the Valencian one. So much so that there they call the restaurants where this rice is served arroceria, and they clarify that they serve rice and paella.

Also There is a concept among Cuban chefs that calling what we make "rice with things" is an offense. It really isn't. There they call rice with things what is not paella; for example, rice with seafood, rice with duck, rice with cuttlefish, the latter very popular for its black color, or Senyoret rice, an exquisite rice with characteristics very similar to paella, but which is not recognized as such.

Therefore, I hope that very soon we will be able to understand that paella is not a dilemma, but rather a tasty dish of Spanish gastronomy that we should all respect and one day savor. Here I leave you the ingredients of what the authentic Valencian paella should be.

Valencian Paella

For 4 people:

• 120 grams of olive oil
• 400 grams of chicken
• 400 grams of rabbit
• 250 grams of bachoqueta (flat green beans)
• 150 grams of garrofón
• 70 grams of grated tomato
• 40 grams of chopped or ground garlic
• 400 grams of Valencia or Bomba rice, according to your preference
• 800 ml of water
• 1 gram of saffron
• 5 grams of sweet paprika
• 1 sprig of rosemary
• Salt and pepper to taste

I just need to add that you must put 1,000 grams of love and the infinite pride that Valencians feel for this exquisite dish.