This is one of my favorite dishes. It is simple and easy plus you only need one pan to cook it, less washing for me. :o) The secret to a great Paella is the Saffron. It gives this dish an exquisite flavor in my opinion. Saffron is quite expensive but is essential for a real Paella. I also have a Paella pan to cook it in. If you don't have one, you can use any saute pan that is big enough. You can also cook it in a regular wok and transfer it to a baking dish. I took this photo while the Paella was still cooking so it has some liquid left.

The recipe I used didn't call for shrimps but I added it anyway since I love it and I'm the cook. LOL If you are adding shrimps, do it at the last 5 or so minutes of cooking, depending on the size of your shrimps. If you'll notice in the photo, only one half of the Paella has green peas, that's because my husband hates it while I like it. LOL The recipe also calls for roasted chicken but if you don't have left-over chicken, you can use fresh chicken. I put salt and pepper on fresh chicken and fry it it a little oil.

Here is the recipe I used from Epicurious.

Whenever I have leftover cooked rice, I make some kind of 'Sinangag' (fried rice) with it. Usually I'll just add garlic, carrots and eggs. But if I have some shrimp leftover from dinner, I recycle it and add it to my sinangag.

Nothing special with this recipe, as you all know, making sinangag is a 'no-brainer'. The trick to making a 'great' sinangag against a 'so-so' version is the rice. It has to be dry or else you will end up with a 'mushy' blob. Cooking it long enough to get the right texture is the key. Wait, did I say 'it's a no-brainer'? I guess not. LOL

In most of the Chinese restaurants I've been to here in New England, their fried rice is very dark because they use soy sauce in it. It was quite a shock really, after being used to the ones in California. I made it once with soy sauce but it didn't turn out quite as dark. I tried adding Oyster Sauce but found it too sweet. In my one and only Chinese recipe book (authored by Eileen Lo), there is a recipe for fried rice. If I remember it correctly (since I'm too lazy to get up from my seat and check) there is a concoction of Chinese cooking wine, soy sauce, oyster sauce, etc. I made it a couple of times and it is very good but surprisingly not as dark as the restaurants'.

If you are having Tocino, Longganisa, daing na Bangus or some kind of dried fish like Tuyo or Danggit, it won't be as satisfying if you do not pair it with sinangag. I guess it's just nostalgia. In the Philippines, our maid always cook sinangag for breakfast every time we have Tocino, etc.

Old habits die hard, wouldn't you say so?

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