Paella!

Valencia is known as the "Garden of Spain".  The area around the city grows not only the famous Valencia oranges, but all kinds of fruits and vegetables.  It is also Spain's main producer of rice, and that rice is the main ingredient of Valencia's most famous dish, paella.

The paella with which we are most familiar, saffron rice with a variety of shellfish, was not invented until the 1920s at some of Valencia's seafront restaurants.  The original paella contained chicken and rabbit.  
  
We both wanted to try paella while in Valencia.  I do not care for shellfish, but there is also a vegetable paella which I was interested in tasting.  So we set out yesterday evening seeking the city's classic culinary creation.  We stopped in a restaurant called Vicentino that we had noticed previously.  While looking at the case filled with tapas, a local patron who had just finished eating, told me that the fried codfish was very good.  I asked her how the paella was. She said that she had not eaten the paella there, but since the food was very good, she suspected that the paella would be good too.

With that recommendation from a resident, we decided to eat there.  The paella is served for a minimum of two people, so Phyllis was kind enough to forgo the shellfish, and we ordered the vegetable paella.  It also takes 25 minutes for them to prepare the paella, so while we waited we had a tapa of fried codfish.  It was indeed very tasty.

    
The paella comes to the table in the large pan in which it is prepared.  I am no expert, and I can't judge how this restaurant compares with other places.  All I know is that this paella was scrumptious!!!  Phyllis had a couple servings, and I devoured the rest.