Earl Cooks TJ's Seafood Paella

Even with 64+ years under my belt, there are still some famous dishes I have yet to try. The reasons vary, but I am trying to remedy that. Tonight will be a step in that direction. I will admit here that I am cheating a bit. Neither my wife nor I have had paella, and I saw some in the frozen food section at Trader Joe's and thought we should give it a try. If you have never been to Trader Joe's, I think you are in for a treat. They offer dishes you would normally not find in the frozen food section, and most of them are quire reasonable. This paella has ingredients my wife has never tried like mussels and squid. I have not had mussels but have tried fried calamari, so that counts, right? Now, for bit of a cephalopod detour, when I was quite young, and shopping with my mom at the store we frequented often, I was in for a big surprise...shock really.

This was around the same time Disney re-released 20.000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne. Anyway, I walked around the aisle I had walked around many times before and there in all it's glory was a GIANT OCTOPUS, tentacles spread across a 4 foot section of the meat case on top of crushed ice! I was in total shock! I must have been about 8 or so and had never seen a real sea monster, especially in the grocery store. I think my mom knew it was there and wanted to shock me. She did! Okay, back to the paella.

The instructions were simple and it cooks in less than 10 minutes. Just preheat a non-stick skillet on HIGH. When it is fully heated, cut the package open and dump it into the hot skillet and cover. The rice, seasonings, and seafood (shrimp, squid rings, and mussels) are in the bag. The slowest to cook is the shrimp. After 3 or 4 minutes remove the cover, spread everything around and allow to cook just 2 minutes more.

As you can see it has a vibrant color which, in most paella, is from saffron, but my guess is that this is mostly from turmeric. Both are named ingredients on the package.

Results & Conclusions

I liked it, but the degree of HEAT was unexpected, and probably too much for my wife. It said it was 2 servings, but not big servings. They say it is ⅓ seafood, which seems about right. While this was everything it was advertised to be, we won't be buying it again. If I go down the paella trail again, it will be homemade...or at a restaurant, if I can find one that serves it!