It’s time to lighten issues up. As we exit the vacations, we formally enter bowl-food season. Wealthy and heavy vacation dinners — that includes cocktails and a number of programs, ribs and roasts, sauces and reductions — will take a New Yr’s timeout, changed by steaming bowls brimming with heat and nourishing soups and stews. And whereas meat is definitely welcome to hitch the bowl-fun, the lightness of seafood is a refreshing various. It’s time for a cioppino.
Cioppino is a San Francisco seafood stew that originated within the 1800s when the Italian and Portuguese fishermen chopped up leftovers from their each day catches to make a sturdy tomato-based soup. Its identify is derived from the Italian time period ciuppin, which implies to cut. Wine is a key ingredient within the cioppino inventory, and recipes gamely name for white or pink, relying on the supply. I choose to make use of pink wine, which provides extra fruit and fewer acidity to the broth.
As for the fish and shellfish, there isn’t any set rule, besides to decide on as recent as potential. Choose a wide range of shellfish and seafood, comparable to clams, mussels, shrimp and scallops, and thicken the soup with chunks of firm-fleshed white fish, comparable to halibut. Whereas many cioppinos embody crab, which is native to and considerable within the San Francisco Bay space in the course of the winter season, it may possibly simply be omitted. In case you have entry to crab, buy the cracked legs or just purchase the cleaned meat for a splurge.
In contrast to many stews that style higher with time, this stew is supposed to be eaten right away to seize the freshness of the fish. This rule was heeded with my pot of stew, since I had no time to model a reasonably picture earlier than it was devoured, leaving me solely with the method shot you see right here.
Cioppino
Lively time: 50 minutes
Whole time: 50 minutes
Yield: Serves 6
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
1 medium fennel bulb, halved lengthwise, thinly sliced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon crushed pink pepper flakes
1/4 cup tomato paste
1 (28-ounce) can crushed Italian plum tomatoes
2 cups medium-bodied pink wine
2 cups rooster inventory
2 tablespoons recent orange juice
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly floor black pepper
1 teaspoon granulated sugar (elective)
12 to 18 littleneck clams
12 to 18 mussels, scrubbed and debearded
1 pound massive (18/20) shrimp, peeled, deveined, tails intact elective
1 pound agency white fish, comparable to halibut, reduce into 1-inch chunks
Chopped recent Italian parsley for garnish
Warmth the oil in a big soup pot or Dutch oven over medium warmth. Add the onion and fennel and prepare dinner till the greens soften, 3 to 4 minutes, stirring steadily. Add the garlic, oregano and pink pepper flakes and saute till aromatic, about 1 minute. Stir within the tomato paste and prepare dinner for about 1 minute extra, stirring to create a slurry. Add the tomatoes, wine, rooster inventory, orange juice, bay leaf, salt and black pepper. Convey to a boil and simmer, partially lined, for half-hour. Style for seasoning and add extra salt or the sugar, if desired.
Add the clams to the pot, cowl and prepare dinner over medium warmth about 5 minutes. Add the mussels, cowl the pot and prepare dinner 3 to 4 minutes extra. Discard any unopened clams or mussels.
Stir within the shrimp and halibut, partially cowl the pot, and simmer till the fish is cooked by, about 5 minutes.
Ladle the stew into heat serving bowls and garnish with parsley. Serve with crusty bread or garlic bread.
Lynda Balslev is a cookbook writer, meals and journey author, and recipe developer based mostly within the San Francisco Bay space, the place she lives along with her Danish husband, two kids, a cat and a canine. Lynda studied cooking at Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Delicacies in Paris and labored as a private chef, culinary teacher, and meals author in Switzerland and Denmark.