It must be difficult being a noodle in Spain. How can you stand up to the wonderful rice dishes that the Spaniards are known for. Almost every Spanish cookbook I own will have a section on Paellas*, and at the back of the section is maybe one (if lucky) recipe on the fideos. It doesn’t even get its own section! It’s a pity that fideos tends to take second place to the Paella when I think it is just as delicious – and for me, a much more forgiving dish!
Fideos, translated into english, refers to noodles – they are thin pieces of noodles, no longer than your thumb. Many recipes call for fideo noodles, there is no reason why you can’t use thin spaghetti or angel hair noodles, broken into 1.5 to 2 inch lengths. In my Mom’s restaurant they used to bake their fideos with pork spareribs and sausages but today I’ve decided to share with you my version – with mussels and prawns. A little bit healthier and just as good!
I like to think of fideos as the rebel dish. It breaks a lot of rules! Let me explain… with most pasta dishes you throw your noodles into a large pot of boiling water, enough water so that the pasta has enough space to float around. With fideos, traditionally they are made in a paella pan and only enough liquid is placed so that the noodles absorb the cooking broth resulting in a rich, and flavourful dish. When making a paella, I’ve been taught, once you add the broth, do not stir rice around. How many of us have been tempted to STIR when we were told NOT TO STIR?! Well, as I said, fideos is more forgiving – you stir the dish often enough until you see that the liquid has coated the noodles and seafood in an almost syrup like coating.
Traditionally fideos has been made with saffron. If you aren’t willing to spend on good quality saffron, I wouldn’t even bother putting it as inferior quality saffron will hardly make a dent in the taste. If you can’t get a hold of saffron, or don’t wish to shell out the money for it, I suggest you omit it completely.
Also, this is traditionally made in a paella pan. Tonight, I couldn’t be bothered and used a heavy based pan instead. It turned out just as well!
As I said – this dish breaks a lot of rules!
Prawn and Mussel Fideos
Recipe (for two)
- 120 grams fideos or dried angel hair pasta, broken into 2 inch lenghts
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1/2 onion, finely diced
- 2 cloves garlic, crushed
- 1 teaspoon sweet paprika
- 2oo grams canned tomatoes, crushed
- 375 ml fish or chicken stock (good quality store bought is fine)
- 70 ml dry white wine
- 1 bay leaf
- 6 large prawns, peeled and deveined
- a handful of mussels, cleaned and debearded OR you can use clams or a combination
- salt and pepper to taste
- Heat a pan with one tablespoon of olive oil and lightly fry the fideos noodles until golden brown but not burned. This should take around 5 minutes.
- Remove the noodles from the pan and set aside
- Next, add more olive oil and saute the onion and garlic until translucent.
- Add the sweet paprika and the canned tomatoes and cook until the tomato sauce is thick, this will take around 10 to 15 minutes.
- In a separate pan, heat the stock, white wine and the bay leaf. Once boiling, add this to the tomato sauce.
- Immediately add the noodles and stir frequently until the noodles have absorbed the liquid. This took me around 15 minutes.
- When you can see that the noodles are almost done, add the seafood and simmer gently for a minute or two until the prawns are cooked through and the mussels have fully opened.
- Serve immediately.
Fideos
*Interestingly enough, what we have come to know as Paella the rice dish made with all sorts of wonderful toppings from seafood, chorizo, rabbit etc., actually refers to the pan in which they are made in. Over time however, people have started referring to the dish inself and not the pan as Paella.
Trissalicious 
Fideo is very common in Mexican cooking and is available at Mexican supermarkets. I live in a predominantly Hispanic area and it is available at regular supermarkets.
[…] to go with that similar yet slightly less well know (at least to me) dish known as Fideua. Many sites refer to this as “pasta paella” instead of rice, which made the Italian in me […]
Thank you for posting this, it´s one of my daughters favourite dishes at nursery, so now I can try it at home.
Superb! I was going to make this dinner the other night – I took everything out, also bought the seafood, etc. And what did I forget??? the Noodles! Will have to have another go next time. This is a great recipe and this a super easy dish! Thanks Tris! Love it!
You can also get this pasta at Turkish and Moroccan markets – I have no idea what it i called –
really inexpensive in my area. And I love the “cheap” saffron I get in moroocan markets – the “inferior” part in the ones I buy is that they can be very “crude” – stems, whole flowers or petals crushed in there.
But flavor wise have had some excellent pkgs. under $1 per ounce.
Oh my! Another coincidence. I was at a Spanish restaurant last night and they had fideos with swordfish as a special. We didn’t order it though. I have to try your recipe.
Oh, it looks so delicious! But my husband’s allergic to seafood, I will try your mom’s fideo, with sausage and pork spareribs…thanks for sharing! 🙂
I love your desserts, now I’m crazy about your savory dishes too..BTW, I have an award for you to pick up over at my blog 🙂
The colours of this dish look amazing. I’m vego, but I was intrigued by the details behind your post 🙂
PS- the best place to buy saffron in Australia is in Indian spice stores – Indians will not settle for inferior quality saffron, so buy it where they buy it 🙂
This looks so delicious! I have never cooked with clams or mussels but this makes me really want to try. Hmm.. if only I could get over my fear of cooking something that is still alive.. 🙂
Fabulous recipe! The colors are gorgeous. I’ve never heard of fideos and loved your story.
I really like paella but have not tried it with angel hair. This looks very delicious. I have to try it.
Mmmm I love mussells and paella is definitely a favourite!!
I have not tried fideos but I am paella lover, so i am sure i will love this dish. I always run out of idea for pasta. This is a good one 🙂
Fun flavours Trissa! I love the idea of toasting the pasta!
That is some seriously drool inducing fideos, Trissa. I made some last year, with shrimp also, but there was a slight ‘burnt’ tasteto my noodles, most definitely due to forgetting about them while I took a phone call..lol They were ‘brown’ by the time I got back to them, so I knew they had gone too long, and didn’t feel like starting over. I think I’ll try again, with your recipe of course! Thank you for posting it..AND…..
I have a little gift for you. You can pick it up here at my blog, way at the bottom of this entry 🙂
http://lisamichele.wordpress.com/2009/12/02/pumpkinny-my-october-fresh-pumpkin-frenzy/
I’ve never heard of this before. Looks amazing!
love it, looks so fresh and yum!
I try not to check out your posts only because I only end up hungry and crave for what you feature. Then of course I only want what you cook. When will that be? Miss you lots!
Bets
I’d never heard of fideos before and can’t wait until I get to try some now. The sheen on those mussels is mesmerizing me hehe.
I love the idea of a pasta paella!
wow Sarap. I am getting hungry looking at the pictures!
Holy cow Trissa. I just realized you’ve been blogging like a mad woman and I had to go back and visit all your back posts. This is awesome. Well all of it is. That breakfasty panna cotta looks especially great and this paella is stunning.
Laura
LOL it really must be difficult to be a noodle in Spain! 😛 I’m so intrigued by this dish!
The fideos as you have it represented in this dish looks like the results of an act of desperation/stroke of genius of someone who was looking to make a paella but found out only at the last moment that they didn’t have any rice on hand.
This is an interesting substitution for the traditional rice. Can such similar fideos-to-rice substitutions work with other Spanish dishes? Would there be some where it would not work at all?
Hi Simon
Funnily enough – I read one of the “origins” of fideos was a fisherman who wanted to make paella but discovered he didn’t have any rice!
Love this! I have fideo left over from a previous experiment and have been wanting to try this ‘alt-paella’. I’m so glad that this dish doesn’t absolutely require saffron or paella pan (neither of which I have on hand) although it would make an excellent reason to procure either or both!
Well, I had no idea this dish even existed so there you go! Poor fideos, playing second fiddle to the sexy paella for all these years.
Great looking and I know they’re absolutely delicious. They must have served this at El Comedor before. And I’ll be eating this when I visit you. 😀