Cazuela de fideos

Tam West

This is a dish from Catalonia and is a seafood and vegetable stew with thin noodles, cooked a little like paella but using pasta instead of rice.

I used Italian whole wheat filini pasta from Sabato in Auckland but any very thin spaghetti-like pasta, broken into 2-3cm lengths, will work. In Spain they cook the dish until quite dry but I like it with a bit more broth.

Ingredients

4 Tbsp	Extra virgin olive oil
2 large	Onions, finely chopped
1	Carrot, diced 1cm
4	Garlic cloves, finely chopped
1	Celery stalk, thinly sliced
1	Lemon, zest only
12	Mussels, well scrubbed (Main)
1 can	Chopped tomatoes, in juice, 400g (Main)
750 ml	Chicken stock
1 ½ cups	Fideos, or thin pasta, broken into 2-3cm lengths (Main)
500 g	White fish fillets, firm, cut into 5cm pieces (Main)
300 g	Raw prawns, peeled (Main)
1 cup	Frozen peas, thawed
1 pinch	Chopped parsley, for serving
1	Lemon, in wedges, for serving

Directions

1. Heat the oil in a deep frying pan over moderate heat and add the onions, carrot, garlic, celery and lemon zest. Fry gently for 10 minutes or until the onion is soft.
2. Add the mussels, tomatoes and stock and boil gently to let the mussels open. Remove the mussels as they open and reserve.
3. Add the noodles and bring to the boil. Simmer the mixture for 10 minutes or until most of the liquid has evaporated.
4. Shell the mussels, pull out the brown tongues and their white roots and add the mussels to the noodle mix with the fish, prawns and peas.
5. Mix gently and simmer 5 minutes or until the seafood is cooked and the noodles very tender.
6. Sprinkle with parsley and serve with lemon wedges for squeezing if desired.

More Mediterranean recipes from Ray

• Granita al caffe with bizcocho
• Torta di verdure ligure