Ciao Chow Linda

Cioppino

Author: Ciao Chow Linda

Ingredients

• The amounts for the seafood are for two very generous servings. If you add more seafood to serve more people, you don’t need to increase the amount of sauce. This recipe provides enough sauce for at least three or four more servings. In fact, after we had eaten all the seafood from the Cioppino one night, my husband and I used the leftover sauce the next day and served it over homemade pasta, and there was still plenty of sauce left in the pan that I didn’t use.

• 1/4 cup minced onion

• 1/4 cup green onion, chopped

• 1/4 cup green pepper, minced

• 1/4 cup celery, minced

• 1/2 of a large fennel bulb, sliced roughly

• 1/2 medium carrot, peeled and shredded

• 4 cloves garlic, minced

• 3 T. olive oil

• 1 26.46 oz. box of finely chopped tomatoes

• 1 26.46 oz. box of strained tomatoes

• (or use all strained tomatoes, or all finely chopped tomatoes if you prefer)

• 1 cup dry white wine

• 1/2 cup water (use it to swish out any remaining bits of tomato from the tomato box, jar or cans you use).

• 1 teaspoon dried basil

• 1 bay leaf

• 1 teaspoon salt

• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

• a sprinkle of red pepper flakes

• 1/4 cup fresh basil, minced

• 1/4 cup fresh parsley, minced

• 1/2 pound halibut, cod or similar fleshy white fish

• 1/2 pound fresh shrimp

• 1/2 pound fresh scallops

• 6 squid bodies, cut into “rings”

• a dozen mussels

• a dozen and a half clams

Instructions

1. Sauté onion, green onion, green pepper, celery, carrot, fennel and garlic in olive oil in a large Dutch oven or pan until limp.

2. Stir in the tomatoes, tomato sauce, basil, bay leaf, parsley, salt, black pepper and red pepper flakes.

3. Heat to boiling and add the white wine.

4. Reduce heat to a simmer.

5. Simmer one hour, then discard the bay leaf.

6. Cut the cod, or whatever white fish you’re using, into two large pieces.

7. Scrub the clams and mussels thoroughly, removing any “beard” from the mussels.

8. Cut the squid into rings, and shell and devein the shrimp.

9. Add the clams and the mussels to the pan, then add the rest of the seafood to the tomato sauce — the squid, the shrimp, the scallops and the cod.

10. Put the lid on and let everything cook together at a simmer for 15 minutes, WITHOUT STIRRING and WITHOUT LIFTING THE LID.

11. If you stir, you will break up the codfish, which flakes apart easily when cooked.

12. Check it after 15 minutes and if the fish is all cooked, serve the cioppino in the pan you cooked it, or remove it gently to a serving tureen.

13. If some of the shellfish haven’t opened, let them continue cooking in a separate pot, which should take only a few more minutes.

14. Sprinkle with parsley and serve in bowls with plenty of toasted crusty bread smeared with olive oil and salt, or over polenta.