More than just paella; choosing the best Spanish rice dishes

Question – what’s the most famous dish in Spain? Answer – paella!

And our part of eastern Spain, the Comunidad Valenciana, is where you’ll find the real thing. So here’s my guide to the best paella in Spain.

The raw material comes from the rice fields around Valencia. And the fishing fleet in our town, Villajoyosa near Alicante, supplies another key ingredient for a great rice dish – wonderful fresh seafood.

Jump down to the end of this post to find my restaurant recommendations in Villajoyosa (aka La Vila Joiosa or La Vila for short).

Paella or arroz?

You’ll often see paella called arroz (simply ‘rice’) on menus on the Costa Blanca. That’s because for plenty of Spanish people, paella means one specific dish from Valencia – the paella valenciana. 

The classic paella valenciana contains chicken and rabbit – but surprisingly, no fish or seafood. It will also have butter/lima beans (garrofó), flat green beans (bajoqueta) tomatoes, saffron and a pinch of pimentón (paprika). And rice of course!

Paella aficionados from Valencia insist that this is the only true paella. For them, everything else is simply referred to dismissively as ‘arroz con cosas‘ – rice with bits and pieces!

But for those who are not so picky (like me!), there’s actually a whole range of delicious rice/arroz dishes to choose from, not just the classic paella. To be honest, the words “paella” and “arroz” are interchangeable on Costa Blanca menus. Just don’t tell people from Valencia that!

Paella de Mariscos, made with cigalas (langoustines/Dublin Bay Prawns) and gambas (prawns)

There’s a world of rice out there!

So let’s explore our options! There are plenty of rice dishes to try.

A paella/arroz marinera or paella/arroz de marisco will contain plenty of seafood.  

A paella mixta (the clue is in the name) will have a mixture of fish, seafood, chicken and maybe peppers or beans. Definitely not chorizo (spicy sausage) though; Brit celebrity chef Jamie Oliver almost caused an international incident when his recipe included it. Proper paella fans were horrified!

An arroz negro (or paella negra) has black rice, coloured with squid ink. I’ve recently come across dishes made with arroz venere. It’s a naturally black rice developed in China,  grown in Italy and supposed to be higher in fibre – though I’ve not tried it yet.

Arroz negro (black rice) is cooked in squid ink, which gives it the black colour and a distinctive taste 

The traditional paella vilera (paella from our town of Villajoyosa/La Vila Joiosa) features rabbit (conejo), chick peas (garbanzos) and may even include snails (caracoles).

You might think that’s a bit odd for a seaside town where boatloads of fish and seafood are landed daily. But it’s a tradition that goes back a long way, to the days when the boats stayed out at sea for weeks or months at a time.

Arroz a banda

Arroz a banda is a typical dish of the area around Alicante. The rice is cooked using fish stock, with small pieces (tropezones) of squid (calamar), cuttlefish (sepia) and maybe tuna (atún). You sometimes see it called arroz del senyoret. 

Top quality rice (arroz a banda) in a traditional paellera, El Hogar del Pescador. 

To be honest, the variations are endless. Lobster (bogavante), rape (monkfish), pulpo (octopus) and just about any kind of fresh fish from the market will all work well in a rice dish. 

Vegetarians can request an arroz/paella de verduras (vegetables) in most places. Be warned; the rice itself may have been cooked in fish stock (caldo de pescado). If in doubt, ask your waiter.

You could really push the boat out and order a caldero de pescado. First you’ll be served a plate of fish, and while you’re eating that, the stock from cooking your fish will be used to prepare arroz a banda.

Don’t plan on doing anything else for the rest of the day! Caldero is a typical dish of Murcia, the next-door province to Alicante, and the island of Tabarca off the coast of Santa Pola, just down the coast from Alicante city.

Arroz al horno de leña 

Travel a few kilometres inland from Villajoyosa to sample a completely different rice style; “arroz al horno de leña“. The rice is cooked in a wood-fired oven (un horno de leña), rather than in a traditional metal paellera on a stove.

Often prepared in an earthenware bowl, it contains potatoes, morcilla (black pudding/blood sausage), a whole bulb of garlic, tomatoes, chicken, pork and chick peas and probably anything else that takes the cook’s fancy on the day.

It’s nothing like the rice dishes you get on the coast – not a pescado nor a gamba in sight – but it’s delicious and warming on a cold winter’s day. The arroz below came from Restaurante Xiri in Monóvar, half an hour’s drive inland from Alicante.

Rice cooked in a wood oven (arroz al horno de leña). Prepared in an earthenware bowl, it’s a typical country rice dish. No fish or seafood involved.

Fideuà

Try also fideuà, cooked the same way as an arroz a banda/paella, but with noodles instead of rice. A dish originally from Gandia up the coast towards Valencia.

It was invented, so the story goes, after the crew of a fishing boat from Gandia ran out of rice while at sea. The ship’s cook improvised by chopping up some pasta he had on board and put that in the pan instead. The crew liked the end result, and so fideuà was born.

Give it a try – a good fideuà has the same deep flavour as an arroz a banda, but the texture is definitely different.

For a fideuà recipe and some recommendations of where to get the best fideuà in Gandia, check out this blog.

Different rice styles: seco, caldoso or meloso

Enough about the noodle – back to the rice. There’s one further choice to make when you order. In the better rice restaurants, you will be asked whether you want your arroz/paella prepared in seco, caldoso or meloso style.

Arroz seco (literally, “dry rice”) is the classic rice dish that most people go for – including (usually) me. It’s so called because the rice has absorbed all the fish stock and there’s no liquid left in the pan.

Then there’s arroz caldoso, best translated as rice served in a thick stock or broth (the caldo). There’s also arroz meloso, which is creamier.

 

Getting the rice right! 

Valencian chefs use a short grain rice (usually bomba) which soaks up all the flavour from the fish stock, but doesn’t fall apart as it cooks. There’s nothing worse than mushy, overcooked rice in a paella dish.

Arroz aficionados might tell you that calasparra rice from Murcia, the next province along from Alicante, is the best. And the Ebro Delta in Catalonia produces plenty of fine rice too. But who’s arguing?  

Ali oli – an essential accompaniment

To make it even tastier, your arroz is usually served with ali oli, a garlic mayonnaise, and wedges of lemon. My advice – ali oli is a great flavour addition to any rice dish, but don’t overdo it unless you want to be tasting garlic for the rest of the day!

Saffron: the most expensive spice on earth

The traditional golden colour of a rice dish comes from saffron and most of the saffron comes from La Mancha in central Spain. Saffron threads are plucked laboriously by hand from the crocus flower.

It takes 150 flowers to produce a gram of saffron, which explains the price tag. It’s the most expensive spice by weight on the planet. Just half a gram of azafrán manchego can cost €5 – but for that money you get enough saffron threads for several arroz dishes.

Cheap tourist restaurants will try to save money by using turmeric food colouring instead. It’s a fraction of the price of saffron. Before you order, look at the rice other people are eating – if it’s too yellow, be very suspicious. 

Top paella tips!

• The minimum order for any rice dish is usually two people, as the rice is prepared in a large round metal pan – a paellera – which ensures the rice is cooked evenly. Some restaurants will do portions for one person, but by no means all.
  

  

• If you’re dining alone (or no-one else on your table fancies rice) and the minimum order is for two, try this. Order a two-person dish, eat half of it and ask to take the other half home with you. Your rice will still taste pretty good warmed up the next day. Sorted!
• In good rice restaurants, the hot paellera should be brought to the table so you can see the dish is freshly made. Not pre-prepared and warmed up in the microwave!
• Ask the waiter to leave the paellera in the middle of your table and dig in. That way, you get to pinch the socarrat; the crusty, slightly burned bit at the centre of the pan that you get when the rice is cooked just right. Delicious! And rice dishes are all about sharing with friends and family. So get stuck in!
  

  

• Most Spanish people eat rice at lunchtime, not the evening. The main meal for many is lunch – supper or dinner is a lighter affair and eaten late in the evening. A big rice dish would be a lot to deal with at that time. Back in the day, plenty of restaurants wouldn’t serve rice at all in the evening, but that’s changed, especially in tourist areas.  My tip – if you’re eating rice in the evening (and I do sometimes!), don’t leave it too late.
• Enjoy some sobremesa time! When you’ve finished your rice, don’t ask for the bill and leave. Stay a while at the table, maybe order a postre and a coffee, relax and chat. Sobremesa culture is expected here in Spain. In good places, the waiters will leave you alone to enjoy life and won’t bother you with the bill until you ask for it. Good for the digestion too!
• If you want to sound more like a local and less like a tourist, pronounce paella as pah-eya, not pie-ella. Have a listen here. Arroz is usually pronounced arrrr-oth with the ‘z’ on the end turning into a ‘th’ sound. Listen here. And here’s how to pronounce fideuà too. Listen here.
  

  

Rubbish paella – and how to avoid it

• Have a look at other tables before you order (or even before you sit down!). Does the rice look wet and shiny? Probably because it hasn’t absorbed all the stock. The chef – if that’s the right word – is in too much of a hurry. Or, more likely, doesn’t know what he/she is doing. 
• The rice is bright yellow – not the dark golden colour of proper paella.  The odds are that genuine saffron hasn’t been used. Turmeric is the usual suspect!
• You never get to see your rice in the paellera, the paella pan. This probably means that they cook the rice in a big batch out the back, and simply scoop it onto your plate. Or it’s been frozen and warmed up in the microwave.
• There’s pizza on the same menu! Avoid at all costs!
• There are photos of paella outside the restaurant. A good rice place will assume you know what a paella looks like!
• Paella may be the most famous Spanish dish internationally, but you definitely won’t get good rice everywhere in Spain. Here’s my personal rule of thumb. The further you are from the Comunidad Valenciana (the spiritual home of paella on the east coast, from north of Castellón down to Alicante) the less likely you are to get good arroz. Yes, there will be good speciality rice restaurants in big cities all over Spain, but too many restaurants are just looking to hook the unwary tourist with rubbish paella.

How to find the best rice in Villajoyosa

Most restaurants in our town – Villajoyosa/La Vila Joiosa – feature rice dishes somewhere on the menu. But these are our favourites:

• Ca Marta: really good quality here. Our current favourite. Eat on the terrace by the Avenida del Port, or in the bar, for the arroz de la semana (rice of the week). Or go inside to the restaurant for a greater choice of rice dishes.
•  El Hogar del Pescador: pricey, but one of the best in town, served in a great location overlooking the marina.
  

  

• Tres14 opposite the marina is good too. Their cooking style is ‘cuina de barco’ (shipboard cooking), trying to recreate the way arroz would have been cooked at sea back in the day. The ship’s cook would have taken a sack of rice on board and prepared it with whatever fish or seafood the crew caught on the day. 
  

  

• Club Nàutic (yacht club) order a rice dish and get a great view of the marina from the terrace thrown in. Good value for money, especially as part of a menu del dia.
• On the seafront in the old town: El Madrid (menu del dia, good value for money). 

Out of town

• Casa Domingo in Playa San Juan, down the coast towards Alicante. It’s right on the huge San Juan beach (Avenida de Niza). Great rice, good wines and a great beach view. Booking advisable. Try also Casa Julio, right next door – it’s just as good. Both places have great value set menus.
• Take a look at this website called Wikipaella, run by a group of Valencian paella fans. There is an interactive map where you can search for a recommended paella restaurant near you, or even for the style of arroz you prefer.

Fascinating fact! 

The Valencian regional government declared paella to be an ‘official cultural asset’  (known in Spain as a Bien de Interés Cultural or BIC) in autumn 2021, because paella ‘promotes unity and sharing’.

And who’s to argue? When everyone is sat around a table digging into a delicious rice dish, you don’t get more unified or share-y than that!

More posts on Spanish food!

• Read my guide to a Spanish fish menu here
• And here’s how to find your way around a Spanish seafood menu
• Buying Manchego cheese – one of the great tastes of Spain
• Jamón ibérico – buying the finest Spanish ham
• A meat-eater’s guide to a Spanish menu 
• My bodega guide to the best Alicante wine

© Guy Pelham