Summer paella - with asparagus

When we first arrived here, Adelina next-door would regularly give us tasty samplings of the local food.

She is not a brilliant international chef, but she is a great local cook and wherever possible cooks using seasonal produce and as cheaply as possible. I've learned a lot from her.

So one Sunday, after we had been here a while, she gave us two huge plates of paella.

The rice was great. The peas were frozen (out of season at the time), and we don't eat prawns. The dogs liked them though.

Paella is not one of the things I have learned to cook from her. But I have learned to cook paella while I have been here. How can you live in Spain and not cook paella?

Tip 1
A good pan.

Mine is cast iron and cost a fortune when I indulged myself buying pans for our Rayburn in the UK (to be the subject of another post in itself...).

Tip 2
Find the right rice.

I use a Spanish rice from the Ebro delta. It's organic and it is redondo (round). It works well but other cheaper rices are just as good. But they need to be for paella.



I made paella a few times in the UK with all manner of things in it. Chicken, rabbit, prawns, fish.... far too many conflicting ingredients. Like a lot of things in Spanish cooking the simpler the better.

So today we had a summer paella. I was lacking imagination and the good thing about it is that it is one-pan cooking so Washing-Up Partner doesn't moan.

I cheated on the local ingredients. The asparagus is imported. There is a bit of a hungry gap here in summer (hot and dry), so inspiration flags a bit and the asparagus is a nice change.

The fresh onions are local, the garlic is from Málaga, as is the saffron, the tomatoes (not in pic) were from a neighbour, and the basil and parsley are out of the garden.



This is enough for two people for a meal, or four as a side dish/starter/intermediary course. With a bit left over for the dog's breakfast because he likes rice and veggies.

Fry garlic, onion, (I used leek too), and basil briefly on a low heat.

Then add the asparagus, chopped into small pieces, obviously leaving the tips intact. If the heat is too high add a drop of water.

Otherwise add the rice and fry briefly before adding more water. I use bottled. I also boiled the trimmings of the stalks in bottled water and used that as a vegetable stock. The chickens then get the remaining cooked stalks.

You can use any sort of stock, but because this is based on asparagus I wouldn't recommend anything too strong or it will detract from the flavour. A very light chicken stock would be the most I would suggest.

I use a mix of a risotto/paella method. That's partly because the bottled gas here has a fierce heat, so adding cold water occasionally stops the rice burning or sticking. If I put all boiling water in straightaway it would be a disaster. Different fuels need different methods. I don't use a sofrito ie frying the tomato with the onion. I add it later after the rice and water as I think it gives a cleaner taste.

Saffron. Azafran.
I discovered after a while that Adelina used food colouring which was why her rice was violently yellow. I have no idea whether I can really tell the difference but I snobbily stick to saffron.

I am not very economical with it either. But I can say after trying various methods of trying to impregnate a golden colour into the rice that adding 3 strands to boiling water in a jug does not work for me.

Far better to put a sprinkling into the pan at an early stage of the frying and later on the rice just suddenly turns a sunkissed colour. I don't really want it to look like I have put in three tablespoons of turmeric, but I want some colour.



Finally - on the risotto line - I think this is equally good without tomato, but with a sprinkling of Parmesan or a similar hard cheese of choice. Again not too much to drown the asparagus.

I've still got a fridge full of berenjenas - but I really don't think they go with asparagus. Berenjenas recipes to follow.

Summertime......and gazpacho time

How many recipes for gazpacho are there on the Internet?

And how many English-speaking people can say they were taught how to make it by their 70+year-old Spanish neighbour?

Who grew up in the campo, and doesn't read and write (apart from her name), and who still cooks Andalucian peasant cooking - even though her family prefers fast food.

Anyway, the answer is - me.

Not long after we moved in, she asked me round to show me how to make gazpacho. And ajoblanco too.

It's coming to tomato glut time. We got a couple of kilos from next-doors the other day after Jose had visited his cuñado. (pronounced - around here - cun-yow)

That's his brother-in-law, ie his sister's husband. But why mention the woman when you can describe the relationship in terms of a man? I know this because my father once described me as his son-in-law's wife.

Back to tomatoes. Today we got a few more kilos. Not sure what the total is now. But the fridge is full. Not much in there apart from tomatoes, but that's a start.

Yesterday we had tomato pilaff. Very nice, spicy but not hot. The chillies - fresh and dried - went in the salad. That way the dog can have tasty rice for breakfast. And we get hot curry, courtesy of the salad.

And while I was making the pilaff, I remembered we had not yet had gazpacho this summer.

So take four or five large tomatoes. Say 1 lb or more. Peel them if you choose. I take out the cores, at least.


Put them in a blender or a batidora container. Add one or two reasonable-sized cloves of garlic. Some slurps of olive oil. Quite a few slurps, eg around 2 fl ozs. Definitely has to be extra virgin, cold-pressed.

If you have a favourite, use that. If you don't like a strong-tasting one, use one of the blander mainstream ones. I use an aceite verdial from Periana in the hills behind us. I doubt it is exported. It costs around 20-25€ for five litres and it is excellent. Droolerific in fact.



Add some wine vinegar. Not too much, less than the olive oil, but say around a couple of tablespoons. Ordinary wine vinegar is fine because you need the sharpness, so don't mess with any trendy vinegars. I use Vinagre de Jerez at any opportunity, but this is not one. Your average 40 cents a litre stuff from the local supermercado is fine.

Add a pinch of salt. I use rock salt. Today I had run out, so it was salt-free.

Blend or batidora it. Put it in the freezer for a short while unless you are organised and have left enough time for it to chill in the fridge.



Then, when it is nice and cold, re-whizz. Zzzzzz. Now this is actually the technical bit. Depending on how much oil you have added, or how juicy your tomatoes are, you may want/need to add some cold water. Bottled - I use Primavera.

The other adjustment to be made is the salt:vinegar ratio. Stick finger in (not while the machine is switched on - apparently one needs to include these sort of warnings because people are really dumb) and test for flavour. A few times obviously. I think I have just breached a few hygiene regs here.

Then pour it out. In our village it is served as a drink, so it comes in glasses or cups. You can add ice cubes if you want.



No, it doesn't include peppers, cucumber, onion, or anything else, either whizzed up, or served on the side. This is a village, not a restaurant.

Finally, Gazpacho Loving Partner was busy painting the house of a neighbour with another English guy. The woman - from Madrid - offered them gazpacho (the weather was well hot). "Yes," said Partner. And promptly had seconds. "Delicioso, muchas gracias."

"God, I hate that foreign slop," said the other guy, (he lived with a Spanish woman) and he didn't touch a drop.

So it's basically a refreshing drink round here. And when I have enough cheap tomatoes - like now - there is always some in my fridge. If you like tomatoes, garlic, olive oil and vinegar - it's for you - great stuff, at any time of day. But if, like Bob, you don't like foreign slop......

Edited to add (in view of the comments)
Note to British readers and others in unsunny unwarm climes - you need sunny grown tomatoes, not nice firm ones from Blackpool or whereever. It tastes much better on a warm day. It's not a cool weather drink. A bit like gin and tonic....