Paella Valenciana

Paella is a rice dish from Valencia cooked in a wide, shallow steel pan of the same name. Short-grain rice absorbs a saffron-scented stock without stirring, so the grains stay separate and the base develops the caramelised crust known as socarrat.

The original paella Valenciana uses rabbit, chicken, green beans and garrofó beans; seafood versions with prawns, mussels and squid are popular along the coast. Lemon wedges are served on the side.

Paella grew from the rice paddies of the Albufera lagoon near Valencia in the nineteenth century, where farm workers cooked rice over open fires with whatever was to hand. The name comes from the Latin patella, a flat pan.

In Valencia the dish is a Sunday ritual, cooked outdoors over orange-wood embers and shared straight from the pan. Locals are protective of the classic recipe — adding chorizo is considered a culinary crime.