Paella and how to play Smoke on the Water and rescue mayo

With so few refreshingly mild nights left to us before the coolness of autumn descends, it seemed a shame not to indulge in an outdoor meal with friends.

I made fish stock and was considering fish soup, as one of our friends does not eat meat. However it seemed warm for soup, so instead I made a seafood paella, which is also much less work.

I've made paella once or twice before. There are limitless variations. But what they all have in common are few ingredients and ease of creation.

Basically, paella consists of sauteed aromatics (onions, red pepper, garlic), tomato, short grain rice, and stock. It could end here, though I'm sure most paella consumed around the world include the addition of chicken thighs and chorizo sausage. My fish one baked with sliced monkfish medallions nestled under the rice. When it came out of the oven 25 minutes later, I somewhat artfully (for me) arranged atop it barely cooked jumbo prawns, seared scallops, and mussels, then covered it all and let the residual heat and steam from the rice finish cooking the seafood.

I only wish I had enough mussels to include some raw ones atop the cooked dish, allowing them to cook and open up their black, shiney, goodness-filled shells to us dramatically. Of the two-pound bag I purchased from Wholey's in the Strip, only a dozen mussels were alive when I got home. I threw away at least two dozen. Though two days before the paella-fest, I feared for the worst, so cooked the living mussels in some shallot and white wine. I de-shelled (?) them and stored them in their cooking juices. It made for a less dramatic presentation, but the mussels were in fact quite tasty.

I also made some gazpacho to start. This batch was a little different. I had cooked two big bunches of beets along with a roasting chicken on Friday and added a little chopped beet to the soup, which gave it a deep purple, smoke-on-the-water kind of color. (Dun dun duuuun... dun dun dundun....) (Many guitarists misplay this riff, by the way. For the musically inclined, the 5th goes beneath the root here, which gives it its distinct melodic heaviness.)

Keeping the theme Spanish, dessert was orange flans. I added strips of candied orange peel to the caramel.

I had one egg leftover and decided to make mayonaisse for some grilled asparagus. I can't say it broke, because it was never unbroken. But it didn't set, so I was left with a thickened oil that wasn't saucy at all.

So, a quick way to rescue mayo:

Put a tablespoon of store-bought mayo in a bowl, and slowly whisk in your broken mayo (or hollondaise, etc.). The store-bought stuff has so many emulsifiers in it it'll bind anything. You could probably build a wall with it. While listening to Deep Purple.