Cioppino. San Francisco Italian Seafood Stew
By The Well Seasoned Traveler
Cioppino is an American seafood stew created by the large Italian population that migrated to San Francisco from Genoa and Liguria in the early 1900s. In 1906, after the great earthquake devastated the city, immigrants would go to the wharf with a bucket in hand, and fishermen would throw whatever they had in surplus into the bucket, a fish, a shrimp, a mussel. So the story goes. The seafood made it back to camp and cooked in tomato sauce. Cioppino was born. Today it is the signature of San Francisco Italian American dishes.
INGREDIENTS (Buy Here)
3 tbs olive oil
½ fennel bulb thinly sliced
1 onion chopped
3 shallots chopped
2 tsp salt
2 tbs flat leaf parsley chopped
4 large garlic cloves chopped
¾ tsp crushed red pepper flakes
¼ cup tomato paste
1 28oz can San Marzano tomatoes crushed
1 cup dry white wine
1 quart shrimp or seafood stock
1 quart water
1 bottle clam juice
1 bay leaf
8oz clams
8oz mussels
8oz cod cut into 1-inch pieces
8oz mahi cut into 1-inch pieces
4oz grouper cut into 3-inch pieces
8oz shrimp uncooked
METHOD
In a 3-quart pan place olive oil on medium heat
Add the fennel and sweat it for one minute stirring once
Add the onion, let it go at medium heat for about 2 minutes stirring often
Add the shallots and do the same as the onions
Add the garlic
Add the salt and pepper flakes stir all together cook for one minute
Add the tomato paste, mix well
Add the wine, mix everything scraping the bottom of the pan with wooden spoon or similar
Cook for 1 minute to allow for alcohol evaporation add the bay leaf
Add crushed tomatoes, clam juice and the seafood stock
Bring to a simmer, then bring heat to low and cover the pan. Cook for thirty minutes undisturbed
Open the pan, take laurel leaf out, taste for salt.
Raise the heat to medium high
Add clams and mussels, reduce to medium heat cover the pan and cook for five minutes
Add the shrimp and give it a good stir.
Add the fish and the parsley reduce heat to low and do not stir from this point on
Make sure the broth covers the seafood.
Cook on low until you achieve a consistency that it is not watery. If on the contrary you have too little liquid, careful compensate with the water.
Eat with crusty sourdough bread
Buon Appetito
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