Author Notes
I had the good fortune to travel to southern Spain last year where I was introduced to an alternative to rice paella, fideos, or broken pasta. The fideos have a personality of their own taking on a nutty flavor, providing a full bodied backdrop for the seafood and tomatoes. —Summer of Eggplant
Test Kitchen Notes
WHO: Summer of Eggplant is a lighting designer who lives in Atlanta.
WHAT: A dish to transport you straight to southern Spain.
HOW: Toast your fideos; take them out of the pan. Make a stew with your alliums, spices, and tomatoes; add your fideos back in, then the seafood; let it all cook together. Garnish with lemon juice and parsley.
WHY WE LOVE IT: Fideos were always something that we loved eating at Spanish restaurants -- and Summer of Eggplant has given us a great excuse to make them at home. We love the seafood-to-fideo ratio in this recipe; by the time you reach the bottom of the pot, you're not staring at a sad heap of broken pasta. We can't wait to make this the star of our next dinner party. —The Editors
Ingredients
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7 ounces
bag of fideos, or broken angel hair pasta
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1
medium Spanish onion, chopped
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3
cloves garlic, smashed
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1 teaspoon
smoked paprika
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1 teaspoon
dried oregano
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1 pinch
cayenne
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one
14-ounce can diced fire-roasted tomatoes
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1
nutmeg seed, passed over a micro plane 5 times
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2 1/2 cups
seafood stock
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1 cup
dry white wine
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1/2 cup
water or vegetable broth
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1
bay leaf
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12
shrimp
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3
squid tubes, cut in to rings
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12
clams
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12
mussels
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1/16 teaspoon
ground saffron or a medium sized pinch of threads
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3/4 cup
frozen peas
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1
lemon
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3 tablespoons
parsley, chopped
Directions
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Coat a heavy pan in olive oil. Over medium/low heat, add fideos and sauté until they become a warm brown color, about 6 to 7 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, remove them from the pan and set aside.
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Reduce the heat add more olive oil to the pan, if needed. Add onion and sauté for 5 minutes, until almost translucent. Add garlic and sauté for another 3 minutes.
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Add in the smoked paprika, oregano, and cayenne, and sauté for another minute.
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Increase the heat to medium and add tomatoes, shave in nutmeg, and bring to a simmer for 3 minutes.
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Return the fideos to the pan and simmer for 5 minutes.
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Meanwhile, bring stock, wine, water and bay leaf to a boil in another pot, reduce to simmering, adding the seafood one species at a time and removing from the pan and reserving. Cook shrimp 2 to 3 minutes until just pink; squid 1 to 2 minutes until just prior to opaque; clams a maximum of 6 minutes, discarding unopened ones; mussels up to 4 minutes; discard unopened ones. Allow broth to return to a slow boil in between batches. Remove seafood and set aside.
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Add the saffron to broth and let ‘bloom’ for 2 minutes. Turn the heat off of the broth.
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Slowly add stock into the pot with the fideos, in 3 to 4 batches (like risotto). Let simmer with broth for about 20 minutes. When the pasta has reached desired consistency, add in the peas and seafood. Let steam for 2 minutes, covered.
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Prior to serving squeeze the lemon over the top, and sprinkle with parsley.
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