The best Paella in the Bay Area

[LOSSJ]

I'm looking for the best Spanish Paella in the Bay Area. My wife and I love Spanish Paella, we're celebrating our anniversary this weekend and would love a good recommendation.

Hounds Speak up!

[paulj]

I believe there was FoodNetwork Throwdown episode against a SF area paella specialist.

[Melanie Wong]

That would be Gerard, we tried his paella at a chowdown last summer in Occidental. Report here, http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/425550 , and the funny thing is that one of the posters at that time said that Bobby Flay should throwdown with him!

Here's the Press Democrat coverage of the event,
http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/...

I like Gerard's paella. His rice turns out great, but the paella style is not traditional, if that's what the OP is looking for.

[Robert Lauriston]

He's a caterer, and also at the Occidental farmers' market on Fridays from 4pm.

http://gerardspaella.com/

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Occidental Farmers Market
Occidental, CA 95465, USA, Occidental, CA 95465

[Robert Lauriston]

Same question from a few months ago:

http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/516878

[Columba]

Gerard is wonderful.

Another resource is Raquel Hermosilla, a young woman from Spain, who will come to your place and make paella for/with you. I met her at a paella cooking demonstration and was wowed not only by her cooking and instruction, but her warm, friendly demeanor. She often cooks for groups.

I believe she's in the East Bay.

http://www.spainathome.net/index.html

[trespinero]

I really enjoyed the rabbit paella at b44 on Belden Lane in SF

[Maple]

In addition to B44, I have also been to Iberia in Menlo Park and Cascal in Mountain View. Iberia is very old school, poor service and really over-priced for what they do IMHO. I like Cascal a lot - contemporary and excellent food. They do black paella which I love, and they use broken up noodles in some of their paellas, but you can request to substitute rice instead.

[paulj]

The pasta version is often called fideaua. I first saw this on an Iron Chef episode, though it is easy to find recipes as well. There are short 1" Mexican fideos that work well this way. The Mexican equivalent is 'sopa de fideos' (a dry 'soup' of noodles).