What is a quick easy dinner I can make in one pan? is a question most often asked of me. While I know the expected answer is a recipe, they’d be asking the wrong person for a recipe. I’ve been urging people to “Burn Your Recipes” through my online cooking classes and DVDs for years now, motivating them to cook with basic cooking methods over written instructions, and Seafood Paella is no different.
While aspiring chefs and home cooks love to ask me questions, some also tell me I talk too much. If you remember “Cooking Coarse”, my original cooking video series on YouTube, you’ll remember episodes that included much of my well-spoken philosophies that lasted 8 to 10 minutes sometimes. For those that love new methods of cooking without recipes, and don’t want to hear me talk, I created the Food iPod.
The shuffle function lands on Maroon 5 as I start to create my Seafood Paella in one pan. It’s a basic sauté method that will also call upon my knowledge of gelatinization of starches as well. That’s to say how rice absorbs liquid and swells during cooking. This dish is a perfect quick easy dinner because we can accomplish both of these goals in the same pan.
Once I’m sure that the pan is hot by sprinkling a little water on it to evaporate, I’ll add a small amount of olive oil, just enough to coat the bottom of the pan. The addition of dry rice, onions, peppers, garlic, shrimp, sausage, chicken, tomatoes, shrimp stock and tomato juice will all cook together at the same time.
The advantage of this type of cooking is that you are cooking with steam and moisture to cook delicate items. Often, a Seafood Paella can be ruined by high heat that makes the seafood rubbery and the vegetables limp. But, as the ingredients cook in a moist fashion, they also perspire liquids that are absorbed into the rice as the starches gelatinize. This gives a great consistent flavor throughout.
The perfect seasoning for this Spanish staple is saffron. It’s perfect because saffron threads must be steeped in liquid to best use their flavor. Nobody sprinkles saffron on a dish like salt. It’s best macerated in the liquid over time. Plus, it IS the signature flavor of a great paella.
Seafood Paella is a great example of a quick easy dinner that you can make in one pan. It needn’t be made with seafood either. When you cook with basic cooking methods, you can use any ingredients you desire. This method is one worth repeating in your own home.
Seafood Paella is a Quick Easy Dinner is also a video. Watch it HERE
http://www.webcookingclasses.com/quick-easy-dinners/dinner-quick/
I am thrilled to be an E-zine Expert Author and have a number of articles published on a variety of cooking topics (and write new ones all the time!) Page down to see the entire list and click the ones that are helpful to you.
Before I became Chef Todd Mohr, I was Todd Mohr - a guy who liked to cook. A lot of people, including me, even thought I was a pretty good cook. For starters, I had my five meals, well, recipes, I suppose, that I could make well. Being a creative person, I also used some of the techniques from my tried and true \"recipes\" to experiment a bit with new dishes. Some were good and some not so good, and I usually never knew what the difference was.
Through a series of events, I decided to change careers in 1996 and pursue my passion for cooking, so I enrolled in Baltimore International Culinary College. 18 months later, I emerged: Chef Todd Mohr.
The greatest thing I learned in culinary school was the \"how\" and the \"why\" that had been missing from my cooking all those years. My recipes only gave me the \"what\" - which left so much out! The greatest thing I gained in the years after culinary school, was the practical experience from working in kitchens and experimenting at home. Being observant, I learned even more \"hows\" and \"whys\" in addition to \"whats\" along my culinary journey. This experience and experimentation, more than anything else, is what turned Todd Mohr into Chef Todd Mohr.
My experience includes kitchen experience - all the way up to Executive Chef, as well as college teaching experience, starting and operating a successful catering company and then finally, the culmination of all of my passion: opening The Cooking School in Cary NC in 2007.
From The Cooking School, came \"Cooking Coarse\", my daily video blog that quickly gained a loyal You Tube following due to the uniqueness of the instruction offered. It was through feedback received from \"Cooking Coarse\" viewers that I decided to launch WebCookingClasses.com and provide this information to the world.
When I started getting emails that my videos had changed people\'s lives, I knew I was on to something and that was when WebCookingClasses.com was born.
This is my passion - I am excited to share it with you!
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