Cookery: Easy dinners!
Former Celebrity MasterChef winner Nadia Sawalha has teamed up with ‘disaster chef’ Kaye Adams to create recipes anyone can cook…
Pretend Paella
Kaye says, ‘I wanted Nadia to devise a recipe for something like a paella, but not a paella, because that would be far too much faff. There’s still lots of chopping in this, but that’s what 10-year-olds are for. We wouldn’t want a new generation of Disaster Chefs, would we?’
Serves 4
2-3tbsp olive oil
2 onions, sliced
3-6 garlic cloves, finely chopped
3 medium tomatoes, cut into 8
300g (10oz) basmati rice
Pinch saffron threads
1 heaped tsp smoked paprika (optional)
150ml (5fl oz) dry sherry or white wine
400ml (14fl oz) hot fish stock (from a cube is fine)
400g pack of frozen seafood mix
100g (3½oz) frozen peas Lemon wedges, to serve
Handful of chopped parsley leaves, to serve
1 Heat the oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat.
2 Add the onions and garlic and cook for 2-3 mins, stirring, until softened. 3 Add the tomatoes and stir. 4 Add the rice, saffron and paprika (if using) and stir for 1 min.
5 Pour in the sherry or wine. Increase the heat to bring up to the bubble for 1 min, stirring to burn off the alcohol, then reduce the heat to medium.
6 Add the stock and seafood mix, cover, and simmer gently for 15 mins over a low heat or until the rice and fish are cooked. Add peas 3 mins before the end. Don’t stir.
7 When the rice is tender and the liquid is absorbed, you’re ready to go, with a good squeeze from the lemon wedges and some parsley. Nadia says, ‘Don’t let the onions get crispy! And if you can use sherry and smoked paprika, your paella will taste like the real thing.’