Paella on the XL Egg

[R2Egg2Q]

My wife has been asking me to cook paella for a while. I'd been putting it off as it really takes a lot of time to gather all the ingredients and prep for the cook. Today we decided it was time to break in our larger paella pan which is 18" in diameter.

Here's the pan and the prepped ingredients:

Basically we referenced two paella recipes for this cook: one from La Paella and the other from the Naked Whiz site. The Naked Whiz site has Egg specific cooking instructions that were helpful. I couldn't find Spanish chorizo so I substituted portuguese linguica.

I got the Egg fired up and the shiny new pan on:

Browned the chicken a little in some EVOO:

Removed the chicken, and sauteed the red bell pepper, green beans, garlic, and artichoke hearts (not shown in this pic - still on the pan at the time):

Reduced the red onions, tomato puree, and spanish paprika for "sofrito":

Then put all the ingredients together at 350 degrees and tossed in a couple hickory chunks for a little smoke:

Almost there (the bomba rice had soaked up all the chicken broth):

Lifted the edge to see if it was starting to stick a little and for signs of soccarat forming:

Off the Egg and resting:

Then it was time to eat:

It was my best paella yet but then again, I've only cooked this three times now so what do I know? Well, I know it was tasty!

Thanks for looking.

 

[tmehlhorn]

If it tasted as good as it looks i would say it was deliscious

 

[pattyp]

Looks amazing

 

[Will32Rod]

That is out of the park. Looks great.
Gotta try that.

 

[bluetang]

Now that is a thing of beauty!

 

[Ron_L]

That looks fantastic! How was the soccarat?

 

[twinsfan]

I'm trying that on a smaller scale in a couple of days when I get my large skillet.

 

[R2Egg2Q]

That looks fantastic! How was the soccarat?

Good question Ron. I'm no expert on paella so I can't really say for sure if I got good soccarat or not. One of these days I will take a trip over to the North Bay area and track down Gerard (the paella cook who beat Bobby Flay in a Throwdown) and taste his to get an idea of what to shoot for.

The soccarat came off the pan mostly in a light carmelized brown to a small patch of medium brown (see lower right in pic below - apparently a slightly hotter spot in the lump). I forgot to take pics last night of the small sheets of soccarat that came off the pan as I was scooping out the paella. Here's one I took of the leftovers this AM and you can see some soccarat:

Any input on the soccarat from those experienced in making or eating paella is welcome!

 

[NapalmRunner]

That looks amazing!

 

[hav]

Fantastic!

 

[Gore]

That looks absolutely beautiful. Thanks for a wonderful post. That has been on my To-Do list for over a year. You didn't mention the saffron.

 

[Phubar]

Very nice job R2!

 

[nthole]

Ohhhhh man that looks like some good stuff!!!

 

[Groundhog66]

That is awesome, I really would love to try making it one of these days.

 

[Fatback Joe]

Wow. That looks great.

 

[R2Egg2Q]

That looks absolutely beautiful. Thanks for a wonderful post. That has been on my To-Do list for over a year. You didn't mention the saffron.

Good point Gore. We lightly toasted the saffron in an empty skillet and then crumbled it into the simmering chicken broth.

I didn't talk too much about the prep work. My wife helped and quickly said "we need to simply this". :heh:

That is awesome, I really would love to try making it one of these days.

Just buy the ingredients and invite Greenleaf BBQ and his fiancee over and it'll be the easiest paella you ever "made"! :becky:

 

[Big George's BBQ]

That looks amazing What is soccarat

 

[ezoliver]

Looks great! :thumb: I need to get me a paella pan so I can try this...

 

[Phrasty]

Wow That looks awesome! Gotta give that a go! :thumb:

Cheers

 

[landarc]

Wow, very impressive John