This is a fusion between Spanish seafood paella and Chinese fried rice. I use soffrito (see below), saffron and seafood stock to flavour the short grain rice. The paella rice is cooked without the seafood and set aside, together with its socarrat, the toasted, crusty base layer of rice. The seafood (prawns, squid, mussels) are cooked seperately.
The usual ingredients for Chinese fried rice are prepared separatedly... peas, chopped fried egg strips and sausage. Here I use Hua Tiao pork liver sausage in place of chorizo, stir fried over medium heat. The paella rice is then stir fried in a little grape seed oil (for it high smoke point) over high heat to achieve the 'wok-hei' in Chinese stir fry.
To serve, arrange the squids, prawns, mussels around the fried rice and garnish with crispy, fried shallots.
Soffrito is a based ingredients in many Spanish dishes, in particular, paella. It is prepared with tomato, onion and olive oil. Slice the tomatoes in half. Remove seeds and place over a grater to retrieve the puree. Discard skins.
Heat oil over medium low heat. Add onions, sugar, salt and cook, stirring until the onions are soft and golden brown. You want the onion to caramelise but not burn. This may takes up to 45 mins. Stir in the tomato puree, paprika, bay leaves and cook for a further 20 minutes over medium heat. Soffrito is ready when the tomato has broken down and deeped in colour and the oil has separated from the sauce.
Ingredients
1 kg medium size tomato
1 kg yellow onion, finely chopped
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
I tsp sweet smoke paprika
3 bay leaves
150 ml olive oil
