One of our favorite restaurants to visit when we are visiting my home town of Sarasota Florida is The Columbia Restaurant on St. Armand’s Key just before you arrive at Lido Beach.  It serves Spanish and South American cuisine.  We just love the flavorful cuisine and ambiance.  One of the dishes they are famous for is their paella; a slow cooked short grain rice dish full of seafood, chicken, and spicy sausage.  It has long been a wonderful food memory for me.  With this being the season of Lent, we like to create a seafood dish that allows our guest to be rewarded for giving up their meat…..so here it is; my version of this wonderful dish.

Seafood Paella
Short grain rice slow simmered in a savory broth of Amontillado sherry, saffron and tomatoes with shrimp, mussels, calamari, peas and our home made chorizo sausage.  Of course, we can leave the sausage out for our Catholic friends, but it adds a wonderful flavor component to the broth for the rest of us.

Bon Appetite!  Chef Brian