How to Make Paella Valenciana — The Authentic Albufera Recipe

Transcript

Show Host: It is two in the afternoon on a Sunday at El Palmar on the edge of the Albufera lagoon, a wood fire is crackling beneath a wide flat steel pan, and somewhere inside that pan the rice has stopped absorbing and started caramelizing against the metal — the moment Valencians call socarrat. Tonight we cook the only true paella — Paella Valenciana, ten ingredients exactly per the protected origin denomination, no chorizo, no onion, no peppers, no seafood. Joining me are a Valencian Paella Master from El Palmar and an Albufera Rice Farmer.

Paella Master: Paella Valenciana is a peasant dish from the Albufera lagoon countryside outside Valencia in the seventeen-hundreds. Farm laborers cooked one pan over a fire in the open field at midday — whatever was running in the field. Chicken, rabbit, snails, garden beans, rice from the Albufera paddies. In two-thousand-twelve the European Union granted Paella Valenciana protected designation of origin. The official recipe is ten ingredients only. Add chorizo or seafood and you have made arroz con cosas — rice with stuff. That is fine. It is just not Paella Valenciana.

Rice Farmer: The ten ingredients exactly. One — bomba rice or Calasparra rice, two-hundred grams per person. Two — bone-in chicken thighs cut into pieces. Three — rabbit cut into pieces. Four — garrofó, the large flat white Valencian lima bean. Five — bachoqueta, the broad flat green Valencian bean. Six — ferradura, the horseshoe-shaped green bean. Seven — grated ripe tomato, never crushed. Eight — extra virgin olive oil. Nine — sweet smoked pimentón dulce paprika. Ten — saffron threads, one tenth of a gram per four servings. Plus water and salt. That is the canonical list.

Paella Master: The pan and the fire are equal partners with the recipe. Use a wide flat shallow carbon-steel paella pan — exactly one inch of pan diameter per serving, so a four-person paella needs a fifteen-inch pan, an eight-person paella needs a twenty-two-inch pan. Build a fire of orange-wood, vine cuttings, or olive-tree clippings. The pan must heat completely evenly across the entire surface — that is why we use such a wide thin pan over an open fire and not a domestic stove burner. Get the fire to medium-high before the oil goes in. The whole cook is forty-five minutes start to finish.

Rice Farmer: Add half a cup of olive oil to the pan, heat until it shimmers. Salt the chicken and rabbit one heavy teaspoon coarse salt total, lay them around the perimeter of the pan, sear twelve to fifteen minutes turning until both sides are deep golden mahogany. Push the meat to the center. Add the green beans — three cups total of mixed bachoqueta ferradura and a half cup garrofó — fry five minutes. Push to the side. Drop heat slightly. Add three tablespoons grated ripe tomato and one full teaspoon pimentón dulce sweet smoked paprika. Toast two minutes only, stirring constantly. Burnt paprika ruins the dish.

Paella Master: Now the broth. Add water to fill the pan exactly to the level of the rivets where the handles meet the pan — for a four-person paella that is about six cups of water, for eight-person about ten cups. Bring to a rolling boil, simmer fifteen minutes. While it simmers, toast one-tenth of a gram of saffron threads — a healthy pinch for four servings — in a dry pan over low heat for thirty seconds, crumble them into a small cup of warm broth, add back. Final salt taste, the broth should be slightly oversalted because the rice will absorb it back. Total liquid in the pan at this moment is your single chance.

Rice Farmer: Add the rice. Two-hundred grams of bomba per person sprinkled across the pan in a cross pattern, then redistribute evenly with a wooden spatula. From this moment do not stir. Ever. The rice cooks high and dry. Cook eight minutes at high heat, then drop the heat to medium-low for ten minutes. Total rice time is exactly eighteen minutes. At minute fifteen rotate the pan a quarter turn every minute to even out hot spots. At minute eighteen the rice should be just done — al dente — with no surface liquid. Cover the pan with a clean kitchen towel. Rest five minutes off the heat.

Paella Master: Now the socarrat. In the last sixty to ninety seconds of cooking, listen for a faint crackling. That is the rice on the bottom of the pan beginning to caramelize against the hot metal. Raise the heat to high for ninety seconds. Sniff for a toasted not burnt smell. Pull the pan immediately. The dark mahogany crackling crust on the bottom is the prized texture of all paella. Scrape it up with the wooden spatula and serve a piece of socarrat to every guest. Garnish with quarters of fresh lemon — squeeze, never spread. Eat directly from the pan with wooden spoons, working in segments from the edge inward.

Show Host: Three takeaways. One — ten ingredients only. Bomba rice, chicken, rabbit, garrofó, bachoqueta, ferradura, grated tomato, olive oil, sweet pimentón, saffron — plus water and salt. No chorizo, no onion, no peppers, no seafood. Two — wide thin pan, one inch of diameter per serving, over orange-wood or vine fire, total cook forty-five minutes. Sear meat twelve to fifteen, beans five, tomato and paprika two, simmer broth fifteen, rice eighteen, rest five. Three — listen for the socarrat crackle at the end, raise the heat ninety seconds, scrape the dark caramelized crust onto every plate. Thank you, Paella Master. Thank you, Rice Farmer.