We were in the Detroit Airport last week waiting for our delayed flight. I walked into a newsstand to get some bottled water, as we were flying home on Spirit Airlines. (“You wanna breathe on this flight? That’ll be 25 bucks.”) Out of the corner of my eye I noticed the latest issue of Food and Wine magazine, which featured Spain. Figuring that I needed reading material, I bought it. Julian saw it and said, “Maybe we can invite the crew to a paella feed on Saturday night.”
Paella is a peasant dish that’s become alta cocina. We did a paella feed last year, as documented in this post. My mother would recognize paella’s ingredients: Rice, vegetables, and meat, poultry, game, or seafood. However, paella is more refined than the “Spanish rice” Mom used to make. For one thing, she never used saffron. We used the recipe out of the magazine, which used boneless chicken thighs and country-style ribs as the protein. Julian added some Spanish chorizo to his pan. I adapted the recipe for our allium-averse friend and cooked a small pan on the stove top; Julian did a larger portion on the grill. Both versions were well received.
Alongside the paella, Julian fried up some chickpeas (too picante for most of our friends) and I fried some of my Padron peppers. We also made sangrias. Julian made an alcoholic sangria with garnacha wine, apples, peach, orange, lemon, and lime. I found non-alcoholic white grape juice with elderflower and added peach and lime for a sober version. The cheese plate was multi-mammal: Sheep’s milk Manchego, cow’s milk Affinois, and a goat cheese with figs.
For a change, the festivities were sit-down, as we had a smaller crowd than usual. Several of the regulars were in Ireland for the wedding of our former next-door neighbor’s daughter. Guests brought salads and desserts. As usual, everyone left well fed.
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