Paella recipe

LauraT25 · October 2010

If you got a Dutch oven as a gift and haven't used it yet, I highly recommend checking out this shrimp and chorizo paella recipe! It's a healthy version (341 calories per serving, 4 servings total), so it's not exactly authentic, but it is really delicious.

Ingredients:

2 oz spanish chorizo, halved length-wise and sliced into 1/4-in thick half-moons (I used a habanero chicken sausage instead)

6 garlic cloves, chopped

1 t saffron threads (I used 1 t cumin, 1 t tumeric, and 1 t chili powder instead - if you use chorizo, you should probably reduce these to 1/2 t each, since it's more flavorful than the chicken sausage)

1 C long-grain brown rice

1 3/4 C low-fat, low-sodium chicken broth

one 14.5-oz can diced tomatoes in juice (I use petite diced because I don't really like tomatoes)

8 oz medium shrimp, peeled and deveined

salt and pepper

3/4 C frozen peas (I omitted these)

Directions:

1. Heat a Dutch oven over medium heat. When hot add the chorizo and cook until the fat begins to render (~ 2 min). Note: with chicken sausage, you will need to add oil first because of the low fat content (I used ~2 T olive oil). Add the garlic and saute, stirring often, until it is fragrant (~1 min). Then add the saffron, rice, and broth. Bring to a boil; cover, reduce heat and cook at a very gentle simmer 30 min.

2. Stir in the diced tomatoes with their juices. Cover the pot, and continue to cook 25 min.

3. Season the shrimp with salt and pepper to taste, and stir the shrimp and frozen peas into the mixture. Cover, and continue to cook until the shrimp are cooked through and the rice in tender (~10 min).

Note: I bought pre-cooked shrimp, so I added 5 min to step #2, and then only cooked for 3 min after adding the shrimp.

4. Allow the paella to rest for ~5 min, covered. Then fluff rice with a fork and serve.

1/4 of the whole thing, as originally written is 341 calories, 20 g protein, 47 g carbohydrates, 185 mg cholesterol, 5 g fiber, and 883 mg sodium. Without chorizo it's even better for you. It takes a long time, but it's really minimal effort so it's good for weekends when you're home doing chores. And it is really, really freaking tasty! It reheats well to bring to work for lunch the next day, too.

We found that it's pretty cheap to make, since one package of shrimp makes 2 batches, and one package of sausage makes 4 (we froze the rest). We basically just needed to buy the rice, sausage, shrimp, and chicken broth (you could use boullion cubes to save money and always have it around, if you're not worried about sodium) to have on hand, and then it just takes a dirt-cheap can of tomatoes to make it the next time. An additional THREE batches would be three cans of tomatoes and one bag of shrimp, which isn't bad at all in my book!