More dots and more recipe connections

I lived in New Orleans for over 18 years. My partner and I left just a few weeks after Hurricane Katrina.

Originally I am from the Midwest so New Orleans food was an exotic adventure to me. In the Midwest we do cook seafood, but for us a crawfish is a crawdad, and we use them for bait when we fish. We'd never put one in our mouths willingly.:crazy:

So all of the amazing seafood recipes took a bit of getting used to for me.

Now let's connect some more dots when it comes to food. Many of New Orleans traditional dishes are served on beds of rice, or rice based. I give you the examples of Shrimp Etouffee, Crawfish Etouffee, Jambalaya, Red Beans and Rice, and gumbo which is served on a bed of rice.

While the climate for growing rice in Louisiana is good, the rice itself was introduced by the earliest Spanish settlers in the region. Most of the dishes I name above are Creole.

Now put on your thinking caps, and tell me what other countries or ethinicities serve their dishes over rice or have rice as a main ingredient.

Go ahead ... think for a minute. Bet you came up with Chinese food, but that's not what I thought of since I was discussing seafood on rice in the paragraph above,

One that immediately comes to mind for me is Paella, which hails from the Valencia Province of Spain. Even the way Paella is cooked is similar to the way Jamabalaya is traditionally cooked. The pans are different, but the concept is similar. Metal pan over a tripod with a fire source under it, cooked down until all the liquid is gone and the ingredients are indentifiable within the seasoned rice.

Pretty cool, huh?