Paella is one of Spain's most famous dishes and who would I be if I didn't sign up for a paella cooking class? Let me just say, making this delicious dish from scratch made all the difference. The tedious cooking process brought out flavors of garlic, saffron, and many, many more.
I was just as shocked, as I hope you are, with the size of paella we made that day. I walked in to something much more than I expected, with an additional lesson on how to make sangria. So there was my day before me, learning how to make sangria and paella- can't get much better than that!
Let the lessons begin.
“Who's ready to make their own sangria?”
As those words seamlessly left our instructors mouth, a grin from ear to ear leapt across my face. "Homemade sangria" now, she was speaking my language. Along with being a red wine lover, sangria is a great spin on an already decadent wine.
1 Sangria, 2 Sangria, Floor
I know what you're thinking here, shouldn't I be saying 1 tequila, 2 tequila, floor? Not that day. Homemade sangria, like anything else homemade, can be deadly. As the lesson began, she called on a some of the people I was with to help her make 3 pitchers. If you don't know what's in sangria, you're about to! All 3 'bartenders' began with orange juice, about 1/4 of the pitcher, than came the red wine, then came the shots. And some more shots. And some more. But just like any great sangria, it only tasted like a well-mixed red wine sangria. So we sat and we laughed and we ate and we drank, while the paella simmered.
It's Paella Time
“Check to see if they are still alive, before we cook them”
Hands started grabbing at the freshly picked seafood we had just bought from the La Boqueria. We bought mussels, prawns, squid, and clams; some of my absolute favorite seafood and among the freshest I have ever had the pleasure of eating too! Mussels were being cleaned and checked to see if they were still alive with knives. Squids were being squeezed and diced. And prawns were being cleaned. I, for one, chose to sit that part out. I tried at first and then realized my calling was to cut cheese. Yup, that's right, cut cheese. Amid the chaos of homemade sangria and paella constantly being tended to, we also had cheese and ham platters to tide us over. I took my job very seriously, designing the plate as best I could, it's a process, trust me.
Grab Your Seat & Grab Your Fork
Finally, after hard work, sweat, and tears (well not quite tears, but you get the point), we sat down ready to be served our own paella. The flavors that had come through from such a wonderful dish of seafood paella, the tenderness of each piece of seafood, the spices, EVERYTHING was exactly what you would hope for. A day filled with delicious food, thirst-quenching wine, and amazing company there was nothing more I could ask for!