August Daring Cooks ~ Rice With Mushrooms, Cuttlefish and Artichokes

Olga, from Las Cosas de Olga and Olga’s Recipes, chose the August Daring Cooks Challenge for the The Daring Kitchen website. Her choice was a delicious Spanish recipe, "Rice With Mushrooms, Cuttlefish and Artichokes," by José Andrés, one of the most important Spanish Chefs of this time. He trained under well-known Ferran Adria at his three Michelin star restaurant El Bulli.

José Andrés lives now in Washington DC and he owns several restaurants in Washington DC area, such as El Jaleo, Zaytinya, and Oyamel. This recipe is from his US TV show "Made in Spain."

Rice with Mushrooms, Cuttlefish and Artichokes

The first step --make the "Sofregit" which is a well cooked and fragrant sauce made of olive oil, tomatoes, garlic and onions, and may at times be made with different vegetables such as peppers or mushrooms.

Cooking time: aprox. 1 hour

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons of olive oil
5 big red ripe tomatoes, chopped
2 small onions, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped (optional)
4 or 5 garlic cloves, chopped
1 cup of button or Portobello mushrooms, chopped (optional)
1 Bay leaf
Salt
Touch of ground cumin
Touch of dried oregano
Directions:
Put all the ingredients together in a frying pan and sauté slowly until all vegetables are soft.
Taste and salt if necessary

The completed Sofregit

Rice with mushrooms, cuttlefish and artichokes

Cooking time: 45 minutes

Equipment:

1 Chopping Board
1 knife
1 medium saucepan
1 Paella pan (30 cm/11” is enough for 4 people. If not available, you may use a simple pan that size)
1 Saucepan

Ingredients (serves 4):

4 Artichokes (you can use jarred or frozen if fresh are not available)
12 Mushrooms (button or Portobello)
1 or 2 Bay leaves (optional but highly recommended)
1 glass of white wine
2 Cuttlefish (you can use frozen cuttlefish or squid if you don’t find it fresh)
“Sofregit” (see recipe below)
300 gr (2 cups) Short grain rice (Spanish types Calasparra or Montsant are preferred, but you can choose any other short grain. This kind of rice absorbs flavor very well) – about 75 gr per person ( ½ cup per person) Please read this for more info on suitable rices. Water or Fish Stock (use 1 ½ cup of liquid per ½ cup of rice)
Saffron threads (if you can’t find it or afford to buy it, you can substitute it for turmeric or yellow coloring powder)

Allioli (olive oil and garlic sauce, similar to mayonnaise sauce) - optional

The ingreadients

A cleaned cuttlefish

Directions:

1 - Cut the cuttlefish in little strips.
2 - Add 1 or 2 tablespoon of olive oil in a frying pan and put the cuttlefish in the pan.
3 - If you use fresh artichokes, clean them as shown in the video in tip #7. Cut artichokes in eights.
4 - Clean the mushrooms and cut them in fourths.
5 - Add a bay leaf to the cuttlefish and add also the artichokes and the mushrooms.
6 - Sauté until we get a golden color in the artichokes.
7 - Put a touch of white wine so all the solids in the bottom of the get mixed, getting a more flavorful dish.
8 - Add a couple or three tablespoons of sofregit ( see recipe above) and mix to make sure everything gets impregnated with the sofregit.
9- Add all the liquid and bring it to boil.
10 - Add all the rice. Let boil for about 5 minutes in heavy heat.
11 - Add some saffron thread to enrich the dish with its flavor and color. Stir a little bit so the rice and the other ingredients get the entire flavor. If you’re using turmeric or yellow coloring, use only 1/4 teaspoon.
12 - Turn to low heat and boil for another 8 minutes (or until rice is a little softer than “al dente”)
13 - Put the pan away from heat and let the rice stand a couple of minutes.

The completed dish -- a delicious taste of Spain!

Some of Olga’s helpful tips:

(1) In Spain, rice is not stirred as often as it is when cooking Italian risotto. You must stir it once or twice maximum. This tip is valid for all Spanish rice dishes like paella, arròs negre, arròs a banda…

(2) If you can’t find cuttlefish or squid, or you’re not able to eat them because of allergies, you can substitute chicken or a vegetables of your choice.

(3) Sofregit can be done in advance. You can keep it in the refrigerator or even freeze it.

(4) For more information on how to clean and remove the heart of artichokes, please watch this video

(5) To watch how Jose Andres cooks this dish click here.

(6) For help on conversion to metric to imperial, visit this page.

Olga gave us the challenge to make Allioli (a crushed garlic condiment) as the optional part of the recipe, and as much as I love garlic my husband can not eat as much of it as he used to, so I did not make it. Please visit Olga's blog today see two recipes for Allioli.

Thanks, Olga, for a wonderfully challenging recipe and a delicious authentic Spanish dish! I learned quite a bit making it and we enjoyed the interesting flavors.

Please be sure to see The Daring Kitchen web site's blogroll for the links to other blogs that participated in this month's Daring Cook Challenge, and to learn more about the monthly challenges and to see information on how to join.