Paella

If you've been under the misconception that paella (pronounced pie-yay-yah) is a winter party dish suitable for serving from 6 to 8 people, then let me acquaint you with Spanish chef Juan Carlos Galbis.As a result of a bet made after consuming too many bottles of wine, he is credited for breaking the paella-making record by cooking it for 2,500 people in an enormous pan measuring 13 feet in diameter. Obviously he did not bake this in an oven. He cooked it outside over, 1,100 pounds of firewood, and among other ingredients, he used 220 pounds of rice.

All restaurants make mistakes. How they handle them is a test of their mettle. During our visit to 4 Seasons Grille in Gambrills, the kitchen messed up, serving a piece of undercooked chicken. But the staff handled the error professionally and swiftly, and raw chicken aside, the dish was good, leaving us with a positive impression of the place. Located in the Village at Waugh Chapel, 4 Seasons is part of a small, locally owned chain. Inside, the space is full of warm colors and comfortable booths, most of which were filled with families and small groups of friends on a recent Thursday night.

Woodlawn, I'm discovering, holds many culinary surprises. Add to the list the Salsa Grill, an unpretentious and friendly restaurant that offers interesting Peruvian, Caribbean and Cuban dishes. In a strip mall next to a tax-preparation outlet, Salsa Grill's narrow space is dominated by a long open kitchen. Posters touting various kinds of peppers serve as the main decoration. We grabbed a booth near the kitchen and wolfed down an order of nothing-special chips and salsa ($4) while our order was prepared.

  Need a new paella pan or a souffle dish? Best Buy Co.and Cooking.com have teamed up to launch an online store for cooks. The Best Buy Kitchen Shop, a microsite run by Cooking.com, offers more than 3,000 cookware and kitchen products and is accessible within the bestbuy.com online store, the companies said this week. Executives at Best Buy, which sells small and large appliances along with electronics, said the partners hope to offer customers  a “one-stop shop for all of their cooking needs - including a broader assortment of housewares, food and even recipes,” a Best Buy statement said.

PROCLAIMING A DISH "the king" is begging for contradictio -- or combat.But generations of Spanish gastronomes have revered paella as the king of all rice dishes, and with little quarrel. Anyone who has tried the marriage of a humble grain and the seasoning generally avowed to be Earth's most rare, saffron, would agree.But preparing paella, a dish that is frequently little more than rice, saffron and olive oil mixed with whatever morsel the field, shore or sky provides, is another matter. Some say everything but the kitchen sink must be included to make a great paella, for example.

In the pantheon of great international party dishes, you'd be hard-pressed to find one more misunderstood than paella. Here's what paella is not: It is not a yellow-rice casserole. It is not a repository for all manner of meats and vegetables. It is not the Spanish national dish. What paella is is a method of cooking rice, native to Valencia on Spain's eastern coast, that involves sauteing ingredients in olive oil in a wide, shallow pan, adding rice and liquid and then cooking, uncovered and with a minimum of stirring, until the rice is just tender.

Paella is a complicated dish under any circumstances. But when the shrimp has just awakened from a nap, the tomato is kicking the clam and the chicken leg is having trouble wedging himself into the stew pot -- well, even the chef at Tio Pepe's would probably quit in despair.But not Cheri Gough, or her husband, Richard. It was their fondness for Tio Pepe's version of this Spanish stew that inspired the Carroll County couple to make a paella of theirseven children in order to win free round-trip tickets to Spain.

Just in time for the holidays, here's a quick paella recipe that's perfect for the family or for entertaining friends. Read the recipe carefully first, so you understand the two processes: steaming and sauteing. One saute pan and one large Dutch oven -- both with lids -- are required here. The pan sizes are important for perfectly cooked ingredients.To accompany the paella, prepare a fresh green salad. Toss with a vinaigrette and some pitted black olives and toasted chopped almonds.For the sweet finish, try a purchased rich chocolate cake with chocolate frosting to which you've added a fruity garnish of overlapping half moon slices of oranges.

Anything less like its namesake than Westminster's new restaurant Chameleon is hard to imagine.Chameleons are supposed to blend into their surroundings -- isn't that the whole point? But here, on the town's quaint Main Street, the restaurant's spare stylishness sticks out like a sore thumb. (Except that a sore thumb sounds unattractive, and Chameleon is anything but.)The old-fashioned storefront has been newly renovated. Bare wood floors gleam; the off-white walls are hung with contemporary nudes; the furnishings are simple but have lots of pizazz.

In 1989, during the first semester of Sarah Jay's senior year in college, the former Westport, Conn., resident lived with a family in Southern Spain. Every Sunday, the family's matriarch, Isidora, would prepare a lunch of paella for her children, their spouses and her grandchildren. Jay would observe how Isidora sauteed the various ingredients, setting them aside until all were cooked. Then she would assemble them in the paella pan with a layer of rice and other ingredients for the final stage of cooking.

In the early days of my career as a cooking teacher, I was fascinated by the creative aspects of my work. I loved to take traditional recipes and give them new twists. One of my first inventions was a paella salad offered in a course on summer salads. Saffron-scented rice was combined with cooked shrimp, julienned red and green bell peppers and fresh herbs, then tossed in a red wine vinaigrette. Almost overnight, this recipe became a smash hit with my students. Repeatedly, they told me that the paella salad was one of their favorite entrees.

In the pantheon of great international party dishes, you'd be hard-pressed to find one more misunderstood than paella. Here's what paella is not: It is not a yellow-rice casserole. It is not a repository for all manner of meats and vegetables. It is not the Spanish national dish. What paella is is a method of cooking rice, native to Valencia on Spain's eastern coast, that involves sauteing ingredients in olive oil in a wide, shallow pan, adding rice and liquid and then cooking, uncovered and with a minimum of stirring, until the rice is just tender.

We all love sandwiches made from leftover turkey or chicken, but when they grow boring I often turn to other, perhaps more inspiring, dishes. A paella is one solution. The traditional Spanish version includes seafood, sausage and chicken nestled in saffron rice. Here, I've speeded up the process by eliminating the sausage and seafood and using leftover turkey or chicken. Tips Spanish smoked paprika (pimenton; available in specialty or spice shops) works great in this dish, but Hungarian or regular paprika works well, too. Look for chopped onions and peppers in the supermarket's produce aisle.

What would we do without South America? The continent has given us corn, chocolate, hot peppers, peanuts and potatoes. Amazingly, until the conquistadors invaded South America in the 16th century, these essentials were unknown anywhere else. Many of the recipes in The South American Table (Harvard Common Press, 2003, $19.95) include these ingredients, which play a key role in the continent's cuisine. Actually, to call it a single cuisine seems slightly unfair. (Is there such a thing as "North American" or "European" cuisine?

Woodlawn, I'm discovering, holds many culinary surprises. Add to the list the Salsa Grill, an unpretentious and friendly restaurant that offers interesting Peruvian, Caribbean and Cuban dishes. In a strip mall next to a tax-preparation outlet, Salsa Grill's narrow space is dominated by a long open kitchen. Posters touting various kinds of peppers serve as the main decoration. We grabbed a booth near the kitchen and wolfed down an order of nothing-special chips and salsa ($4) while our order was prepared.

Paella -- hot off the grill Never mind the burgers or steak. Next time you're looking for a dish you can make on the grill, try paella. Although we usually make paella on the stove top, this Spanish dish got its start in Valencia, Spain, as a communal meal for fieldworkers who couldn't go home for lunch, according to the USA Rice Federation. The workers cooked their paella on an open fire, adding whatever meat and vegetables were available. Originally it did not contain sausage or seafood, but as the dish migrated to other regions, those ingredients were added.

Spanish folklore offers a charming tale about the origin of Spain's glorious national dish. Surprised by the unexpected visit of a princess, a country innkeeper was unprepared and unprovisioned. What dish could a commoner concoct from the humble ingredients on hand that would please such a majesty?In the kitchen, his clever wife quickly combined bits of this and that -- snippets of vegetables, sausage and seafood -- with saffron-yellow rice simmered in chicken and fish broth."Pa'ella!" (which in Spanish means "for her")

Paella -- hot off the grill Never mind the burgers or steak. Next time you're looking for a dish you can make on the grill, try paella. Although we usually make paella on the stove top, this Spanish dish got its start in Valencia, Spain, as a communal meal for fieldworkers who couldn't go home for lunch, according to the USA Rice Federation. The workers cooked their paella on an open fire, adding whatever meat and vegetables were available. Originally it did not contain sausage or seafood, but as the dish migrated to other regions, those ingredients were added.

In 1989, during the first semester of Sarah Jay's senior year in college, the former Westport, Conn., resident lived with a family in Southern Spain. Every Sunday, the family's matriarch, Isidora, would prepare a lunch of paella for her children, their spouses and her grandchildren. Jay would observe how Isidora sauteed the various ingredients, setting them aside until all were cooked. Then she would assemble them in the paella pan with a layer of rice and other ingredients for the final stage of cooking.

The Riddle of the Compass: The Invention that Changed the World, by Amir D. Aczel. Harcourt. 178 pages. $23. If books were classified like birds or butterflies, The Riddle of the Compass would go into the family of literary nonfiction. This genre deals with topics that might be treated in academic history, science or biography, but without the formalistic jargon, massed detail and elaborate footnoting of scholarly writing. Literary nonfiction, in short, aims to tell true stories in a brisk, entertaining and commercially successful way. Books of this sort are easily identified.