She was quite funny on Oprah the other day and Gweneth said she does not eat anything from four legged animals, except dairy.
She likes fowl and fish. Her Castilian accent is immpecable (I hate her even more, ha, ha) and she knows alot about Spain! I hope she can be the "ambassador" to really open up American eyes to what we on this board already know...Spain is the bomb!!!

Hey Guys, I just watched the show yesterday and I thought it was enjoyable. I don't believe that it is going to be a cooking type show with travel, rather a travel show with some food featured; similar to Anthony Bourdain's show, which BTW he did a segment on the Basque country this past season which was excellent.

I liked Gwyneth, Mario of course. I'm not familiar with Claudia Bassols except that she's an actress from Spain. That I got from the program. One thing I liked in the opening segment was when Gwyn and Mario were in Toledo and were visiting the chef that offered Mario raw (rare) partridge. I think Mario should have know better than to indulge in raw game bird, especially in a foreign country where his gastrointestinal tract is not used to the local microbes. No wonder he got a bad case of "Don Quixote's" revenge! :yuck: Gwyneth was smart not to indulge. I wouldn't have either!

I was fascinated by the chef's technique for cooking rice. I love rice and eat a lot of it. Has anyone ever cooked rice this way? Also, has anyone had any experience cooking with Bomba rice? The grains looked so tiny, they looked like couscous to me. I thought Bomba was more the size of small pearls of tapioca. I use long grain rice when I make my paella simply because I don't care for the texture of short grain rice except for a few dishes like sushi or sticky rice, or risotto. I pride myself in making great rice dishes, thanks to my Mom, she taught me her secrets!

OsoMajor

OsoMajor, I too liked that preparation of the rice dish. I'm thinking it was alot like preparing risotto, which I make often. I use bomba rice for paella, as I want to perfect my paella here in the States, the best I can. bomba is alot like arborio rice, but I think it is a bit shorter than arborio and the texture is firmer too. The thing is, in paella, you don't ever stir the rice, EVER! Or the starches will release and you get mushy or really soft texture. You should try it sometime, you can order it from latienda.com. I think there is a link from MM to their site.
Back to the show, I enjoyed it too and LOVE that they are exposing the wonderful beauty of Spain to America!

I use the bomba rice too for making paella here and it's definitely the rice that is recommended for paella . Making Risotto , I use the arborio rice and it's such a similar process to paella in that you just have to keep adding the stock ( caldo ) so that the rice absorbs it . But Italian friends told me that Risotto should be slightly gritty ( undercooked ) , whereas paella tends to be cooked through .
I wonder whether they'll show that programme on British TV ? I'll have to get someone to record it ! Steve

Ahh Laduque, you truly know how to cook rice! That is the first and greatest lesson in cooking rice, NEVER disturb the rice once is starts to simmer! I had heard some where,(don't even remember where) that Bomba was starchy like arborio and therefore didn't want to use it, as I have had sticky, mushy paella that someone made that was just terrible! :yuck: I'm gonna have to order some and give it a try. I love making risotto and yes, the Italians like it a bit al dente similar to pasta.

Are you guys across the pond getting the show?

Here is a couple of pictures of my paella I made a couple of weeks ago. I was planning on using some mussels but the store was out of fresh shellfish!

I'm gonna try making that rice dish like in the program. It seems like a simple technique, I'll let you guys know how it turns out.

Osomajor-your paella looks fantastic!!! I bet it tasted great too!
We should start a thread and share our paella secrets and trials and tribulations with all

Steve you can view episodes of this show on itunes and on you tube you can see teasers.

We're off right now to a dinner party-my good friends (since high school) just returned from teaching a year in Barcelona and they are making fideua, not a fan,, but she is preparing an all Catalan menu tonight!!

Wow ..That does look great Osomajor ... I know where i'm eating if I ever land in your part of California haha !
Thanks Laduque .. I'll check out youtube ( I'm addicted to it anyway ! )

Steve .

Awesome photos!! I love it!

wow! that paella looks delicious! Thanks for the photos. laduque, how was your catalån dinner? Today Mario Batali and co. are off to Galicia. Can't wait!