Paella Perhaps?

I decided yesterday that I would attempt to assemble a tasty paella for the family. We all enjoy seafood and chicken so I thought, "why not try this every pot in the vicinity required, time hog of a recipe." I prepared my kitchen in advance and all the requisite casseroles, saute pans, bowls, and skillets were ready to perform their due diligence in this somewhat acrobatic preparation of a meal. After reading many different recipes and researching how to correctly steam clams I felt confident that it wouldn't turn out to be a complete disaster and it wasn't, except for those pesky clams..


After much time was dedicated to cleaning the shellfish they turned out to be a flop. I probably over cooked them fearful they might be undercooked and after their demise in the steamer their shells revealed a slimy rubbery appearance to the meat within. So, with their scrubbed five times by hand super clean shells they were shucked into the garbage. I might revisit this again but not until the memory of cleaning the pesky mud ridden varmits is far from my memory. The other not so brilliant spot of cooking prowess (I hadn't cooked this before either) was the chorizo sausage the Spanish dish calls for. I took notice on the package labeling to rid the sausage of it's skin before cooking, however instead of remaining sliced in circular segments, the fat rendered from the heat melted the sausage into a thick goo of red muck. Perfect I guess if I were going for the garish Halloween gimmick of oozing...something but, since that wasn't my first choice, I decided against adding that mess too.
I don't know if I'll cook chorizo sausage ever again I don't think I will ever come to terms with the amount of stuff in there.
After all this preparation which took about an hour had gone to waste I was left with chicken and shrimp. I couldn't keep messing up the protein part of this meal or we would simply be eating white rice and salad for dinner. Luckily for me chicken and shrimp are two of my favorite ingredients and I was able to finish the paella in its remaining entirety. Despite the left out clams and chorizo it was still pretty tasty too.