Paella Challenge
This is actually more of a testimonial rather than a blog entry. The reason is that our foodie-in-training (my brother Karlo — aka Poy) wants me to testify in virtual court that he indeed cooked the food in question. He seems to be encountering some disbelief from his friends that he has kitchen skills.
Well, yes, Poy did cook the Thai-style paella. And he worked at it for FOUR HOURS. Despite the simplicity of the recipe, both he and I are complete ignoramuses when it comes to cooking paella. The recipe looked simple enough but what threw us both on a spin is this instruction — "Add rice and mix thoroughly with oil in the pan." Rice in oil? in pan? Our main question was would it cook properly? Both of us grew up with rice cookers and that cooking rice involves a lot of water. The paellera is also quite thin compared to a rice cooker and we fear that the rice will burn. So, the two disbelievers decided to keep the rice moving (endless mixing for a total of 1.5 hours). We figured that it will cook longer because there’s less water involved and it’s uncovered. I was ok with it — I was not the one doing the mixing anyway.
By the time Poy’s arm started to strain and his voice crack, I have figured out a safe alternative — go back to basics. Use the rice cooker and just assemble the lot in the paellera. Of course we had to prepare a fresh batch of stock and other ingredients but we are at a point of no return.
All’s well that ends well. The rice cooker trick worked. The rice was fragrant with the bagoong, coconut milk and chicken stock. It was a sight to behold after assembly in the paellera — topped with ripe mangoes, strips of scrambled egg, mussels, chicken strips and fresh basil. We were quite hungry at this time but we are not about to chow down without the pictures taken. This dish — more than anything else we have attempted so far — deserves to be remembered.
So, yes, Poy did cook this dish — with a little help from the rice cooker 
(I got the recipe from FOOD magazine, June 2005)
