Arroz de Marisco — Portuguese Seafood Rice

Make a quick stock: fry the prawn shells and heads in a little oil for 3 minutes, pressing them down, then cover with 1 litre of water and simmer 15 minutes. Strain and keep the orange stock hot.

💡 This 15-minute shell stock is the whole flavour of the dish. Water alone makes a pale, thin rice.

In a wide pot, soften the onion and garlic in the olive oil, add the chilli and chopped coriander stalks, then stir in the grated tomato. Cook it down for 8 minutes until it darkens and loses its raw smell (this is the refogado, the flavour base).

Pour in the wine and let it bubble for a minute, then add the rice and stir to coat it in the tomato base. Pour in the hot stock — about three times the volume of the rice — and simmer, stirring now and then.

After the rice has cooked about 12 minutes and is nearly tender, add the clams, mussels and peeled prawns. Cover and cook 4–5 minutes more, until the shells open and the prawns turn pink.

💡 Add the seafood late. Prawns and clams need only minutes — put them in with the rice at the start and they turn to rubber.

It should be loose and brothy — add a splash more stock if it has gone dry. Discard any shells that stayed shut, stir through the coriander leaves, and take it straight to the table in the pot.