Vibrant Veg Paella

Paella is a delicious Spanish rice dish originally from Valencia. This version uses chickpeas and vegetables to add flavour and colour.

You can use any vegetables you have leftover in the fridge instead of buying more vegetables, this dish is a food waste hero!

Skills Check

Follow a recipe; follow food safety & hygiene rules; tidy away; use a timer; use measuring jugs and spoons; use weighing scales; cut using bridge/claw technique safely; use a tin opener safely; crush garlic; use the hob (with adult supervision); season to taste.

Equipment

Measuring jug, measuring cups and spoons, weighing scales, knife, chopping board, large frying pan, wooden spoon, kettle.

Ingredients (serves 4):

• 1 tbsp cooking oil
• 1 onion, peeled and chopped
• 1 garlic clove, finely chopped/crushed
• 300g short grain rice (or paella rice)
• 1 tsp dried chilli flakes
• 2 tsp smoked paprika
• 1 vegetable stock cube, reduced salt, made up to 900 ml
• 400g tin chopped tomatoes
• 150g runner beans, frozen
• 1 red pepper, roughly chopped
• 1 x 210g tin chickpeas, drained
• 1 lemon, juiced (optional)

Method

1. Heat the oil in a large frying pan and cook the onion and garlic for 5 minutes, until softened.
2. Stir in the rice, chilli flakes, paprika and cook for one minute.
3. Add vegetable stock and tomatoes. Bring to the boil and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
4. Add the runner beans, pepper and chickpeas and cook for a further 10 minutes.
5. Squeeze over the lemon juice and serve.

So thinking about Vibrant Veg Paella ...

Rice provides starchy carbohydrate, which gives us energy, and is a good source of fibre, and B vitamins.

Chickpeas are so good for us! They are legumes and like other legumes (beans, peas and lentils) they are packed with protein and fibre. They are also low in calories and fat and contain a number of substances which are thought to be hugely beneficial to our health.

Vegetables are so good for us! Low in fat, sugar and calories and high in vitamins and minerals.

Nutritional Information

per 653g serving
% of an adult's reference intake
Typical values per 100g: Energy 287kJ / 68kcal

Notes

A traffic light system is used on nutrition labels to make it easier to see which foods and drinks are lower in calories, fat, sugar and salt. Try and choose more ‘greens’ and ‘ambers’ and fewer ‘reds’, and stick to smaller portions of ‘reds’.

Just because a recipe or a food has a red traffic light doesn’t mean you shouldn’t eat it. Understanding why a food or recipe might have a red light can be helpful. For example oily fish is high in total fat and so any recipe containing oily fish is likely to be ‘red’ for fat. But it is recommended that we eat oily fish at least once a week because the type of fat it contains is beneficial for our health.

% Reference Intakes are also shown. Reference Intakes are guidelines about the approximate amount of particular nutrients and energy required for a healthy diet (based on an average-sized woman doing an average amount of physical activity). Most children will require less than these Reference Intakes. The contribution of one serving of a food or drink to the Reference Intake for each nutrient is expressed as a percentage.