El Avion Smoked Paprika

ELAPAPSMOKEl Avion Smoked Paprika

El Avion produce both the ‘hot smoked’ and ‘mild (or sweet) smoked’ varieties, but whether its smokiness with or without heat you require, rest assured that both are of the highest quality and can boast making the list of Delia Cheat Ingredients.

Peppers for El Avion smoked paprikas are harvested by hand in September and smoke-dried over slow-burning oakwood for about two weeks. The smoked peppers are then sent to a mill where the stalks and the unwanted part of the core is removed, and then ground by electronically operated stone wheels, with care taken not to overheat the powder and taint the pure flavour and colour.

The best crops of paprika (pimentón) are found in De La Vera in Northern Extremadura, where the soil, climate and precipitation are ideal for many varierties of the sweet bell peppers that have been cultivated since Christopher Columbus brought the first ones back from his second voyage to America.

The mild smoked paprika is most famously used in chorizo or sprinkled on octopus with extra virgin olive oil in Spain, but has many culinary uses in everyday cooking: for example, with tomato sauces, soups and casseroles, or sprinkled onto chicken before roasting, and in paellas. The hot paprika is used in similar ways for those who like more heat (picante) and is that distinctive spice used in chorizo.

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