So, it's March! Me and my moms birthday month. I wanted to do something special for her birthday dinner and surprise her. My mom loves vegan seafood and i remember her mentioning this dish. I got the recipe from Tasty it's by Kiki Canuto, to be honest, she could probably be my distant my cousin (Canuto, Carvalho? Similiar no?). Anyways, From this recipe and from what i researched, Arroz De Marisco is kind of like a paella, it has calamari, shrimp and mussels. Unfortunately vegan mussels don't exist yet so we'll be using hearts of palm for the calamari, and vegan shrimp found at my local vegan restaurant.
First, i cooked some basmati rice since it called for long grain white rice and basmati is my favorite. I added bay leaves and vegan butter. Next, i diced 3 bell peppers and an onion and sauteed them in olive oil just like in the Tasty video.
This is where i switch up since I'm using vegan ingredients. I add two veggie bullion cubes and 4 cups of water 2 tablespoon of Old Bay, Kelp flakes, garlic powder, chili lime seasoning (from Trader Joe's), since this is vegan, i want to infuse the broth with fishy flavor. I also add a small can of tomato paste, chopped up seaweed snacks, lemon juice and cover it.
To make the hearts of palm look more legit, i cut tiny circles out of them (i keep the cut outs and add them to the dish also). I added kelp flakes and Old bay with the hearts of palm in a bowl.
When the broth started boiling, i add the hearts of palm to the broth, peppers and onions.
And add the shrimp.
Then i added the cooked rice to a large bowl, added the ''seafood'' to the the rice and a few scoops of the broth. This smelled and tasted so good. It's a little spicy and super flavorful.
My mom loved it and she said it tasted how she remembered it. It's all about the seasonings like i always say! Letting the vegan shrimp and hearts of palm cook in the ''fishy'' broth is very important and makes it taste so good! Making this dish made me feel special and i will defiantly do it again.
