Josh Shear

I haven't really had a chance to try something new in the kitchen for a while. So I thought, "Hmm, who wouldn't love some paella tonight?" And there was paella.

I cooked the rice in a rice cooker; it's white rice with turmeric, because apparently saffron is unavailable in my local supermarket. I did a quick Google search in the spice aisle, and discovered turmeric is "the poor man's saffron." Good enough, I guess. It was tasty anyway.

While the rice was cooking I had two other items on the stove:

• A pan with diced onion, diced red pepper, hot sausage and bay scallops, seasoned with black pepper and dried parsley sautéing in olive oil
• A pot with littleneck clams and shrimp (I also got two cherrystones to serve as a strong visual, for presentation – that's the big clam you see on the right).

When the rice was done, I mixed in some peas. I drained the sausage/scallop mixture and added it, then the clams and shrimp and tossed the whole lot together.

We enjoyed it with this year's Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais Nouveau, which is probably the best vintage in a few years. I always forget how much I like this wine.