ilonggoLIVINGinCanada

July 26, 2009

It has been over a month now since I posted Arroz a la Paella. That post was the catalyst in preparing today’s dish, the Arroz a la Valenciana. They are both undeniably Spanish in origin and did you know that both originated from the province of Valenciana in Spain? Comparatively speaking, each are prepared differently. The paella is basically baked, whereas, the valenciana is purely stovetop cooking. As to their distinctive ingredients, the paella calls for a variety of seafoods while the valenciana, more of a variety of meat.  White wine and saffron is needed in paella, while the valenciana requires turmeric powder and optional gata or coconut milk. But basically, the main ingredient for both is rice (as the name arrroz implies).  Back in the Philippines, arroz a la Valenciana or Bringhe in Pampanga, is a special dish prepared only during special occasions such as town fiestas, weddings or Christmas dinner. Valenciana is at times dubbed as poor man’s version of paella. But today, I will prepare mine as lavished as paella.

My lavish Arroz a la Valenciana

Ingredients & Procedure:

This recipe calls for a 1:3 ratio of glutinous rice (malagkit, pilit) over regular rice. In doing this, your rice mixture won’t be that sticky. The rest of the ingredient are: pork, shrimps, chicken breast, Spanish sausage (chorizo), green peas, red bell pepper, chives, tumeric powder, achuwete and gata. It is interesting to note that after boiling your meats (except chorizo), use the soup to cook the rice together with the turmeric powder and achuwete. Slice up your cooked meats and save the head of shrimps to be pounded in a mortar and pestle to extract the juice.

Sautee garlic, onion, all the meats and add gata (coconut milk) and the juice extracted from the shrimp’s head. Let it boil for 15 minutes. Adjust salt. Add your cooked yellow rice, followed by your red pepper, green onions, green peas and raisins. In lieu of raisins, I used black mission figs for a change. Stir rice mixture occasionally for the next 10 minutes under low flame so as to allow admixture of ingredients.   Place valenciana on a platter and garnish it with sliced hard boiled eggs.  Note: Some people do shortcuts to avoid sauteeing and the final “tiring” stirring part of cooking by putting all the ingredients at once while cooking up the rice. That’s doable, but, one will sacrife the flavor tremendously.

The process of cooking valenciana is somewhat more tedious than paella.

PRESTO! A flavourful ARROZ A LA VALENCIANA!

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