Mother, daughter team win international paella honors

Photo by Alex Dominguez

DOWNEY - Two Downey residents have recently returned home after garnering international accolades for their paella.

Mother and daughter team of Natalie and Maria Curie recently took the prize for “Best International Paella” at the International Paella Competition held in Sueca, Valencia.

“It’s definitely a great accomplishment,” said Natalie, 28.

Paella, a traditional Spanish dish, usually consists of rice, water, saffron, chicken, and rabbit, Natalie says.

“That is a traditional Valencian paella,” said Natalie. “There’s all different types of paellas, but that is the traditional one.”

The Curie family has been in the restaurant industry within the local area for around 20 years, however started incorporating paellas into their business – El Coraloense - around six years ago.

“What we used to cook was not a traditional paella,” said Natalie. “Once we started competing, it’s crazy how many different options there are out there, and not only that what the actual technique and tradition of what Paella Valenciana is.”

This is the third time that Natalie and Marie entered the yearly competition.

Natalie says that competing internationally was “definitely intimidating.”

“The industry is very male dominated,” said Natalie. “As women, and being a young chef myself, we really get underestimated a lot.”

However, that didn’t stop Natalie and Maria from coming out on top of 40 other teams from all over the world.

“This is probably one of the best prizes we could get as an international team,” said Natalie.

“Certain [prizes] are just for locals from all over Spain. It’s divided into three or four categories,” added Maria. “For international, this is the best one.”

There wasn’t much time to celebrate however, as just a week later both Natalie and Maria were competing again at the World Paella Day Cup representing Paella Fest United States.

“We won second place for best paella in the world,” said Natalie.

And they weren’t far from taking it all, either.

“We were three points away from taking the trophy,” said Maria.

Natalie and Maria are hoping to bring paella into Downey soon. In the meantime, Natalie hopes that their victory will inspire others.

“I just think it’s very important to never give up on yourself,” said Natalie. “Despite adversities or different things that come at you, you know, we’re in a global pandemic, and we never gave up; we kept going.”

“They say ‘the third times the charm.’ This time, we really worked our butts off, and it happened.”