Bouillabaisse, chowder and cioppino get creative upgrades
October 18, 2017
It’s the season for bouillabaisse, chowder, cioppino and zarzuela de mariscos — satisfying soups and stews made with clams, cod, lobster and other succulent fruits of the sea.
Right about now, chefs in every region of the United States are stirring up inventive versions of favorite fish stews and seafood soups, with an eye toward serving diners hearty meals to remember.
“I enjoy serving this dish because it reminds me of my time cooking bouillabaisse while working as a young line cook at Le Cirque,” said James Friedberg, executive chef of Nickel & Diner in New York City.
In October, Friedberg introduced a refined take on the classic seafood stew at this upscale, old-fashioned diner. It starts with a rich broth made with lobster shells, tomato paste, white wine, Pernod and aromatics (garlic, fennel, shallots, onion and celery), and it’s finished with prawns, striped bass, mussels, potato confit, leeks and saffron.
“It is different than most stews in that the garnishes and sauce are prepared separately,” Friedberg said. “This gives it a much cleaner flavor and sophistication that other stews are usually lacking. Pernod is also added to complement the flavor of lobster.”
Samir Roonwal, the new executive chef of The Beverly Wilshire in Beverly Hills, Calif., also is whipping up a spin on seafood stews from the Mediterranean. At The Blvd, a restaurant and lounge inside the hotel, Roonwal added zarzuela de mariscos, which hails from Spain’s Catalan coast.
Chef Dolan Lane’s deconstructed seafood chowder at Red Star Tavern in Portland, Ore.
The stew is made with shrimp, mussels, almonds, white wine, saffron, prosciutto, onion, garlic, red bell pepper, tomatoes, tomato paste, paprika and parsley. Roonwal serves the dish in a cast-iron skillet with a side of hand-torn bread croutons. The stew resembles bouillabaisse, he said, but is more rustic, bolder and includes the unexpected addition of prosciutto.
“In Spain, spiced sausage meat is commonly used to flavor [seafood] stews to increase its intensity,” Roonwal said. “We used prosciutto to add a bit of saltiness to our version.”
Seafood soup features prominently in many Asian cuisines. On the menu at Monkey 68, a Pan-Asian restaurant inside a converted home in Atlanta, owners Mali Hu and George Muh infuse the menu with their Korean and Taiwanese cultures to create “clever combinations of Asian flavors.”
The restaurant currently serves a small dish of spicy miso soup Korean-style, with tofu, mussels, Korean squash and exotic mushrooms. Also on the menu is a larger, shareable truffled seafood stew, made with seafood broth, squid, shrimp, mussels and crispy rice, instead of traditional noodles. It also has non-traditional black truffle oil.
Atlantic Seafood Company, an upscale seafood house in the suburbs of Atlanta, takes a modern approach to traditional fish dishes, including a seafood gumbo made of kitchen scraps. To create a unique dish and reduce waste, fish such as halibut or cod that is trimmed to make sushi or other dishes is mixed with ingredients such as Andouille sausage, okra, crawfish and scallions to make a fresh — and always changing — seafood gumbo.
Across the country, in Portland, Ore., chef Dolan Lane of Red Star Tavern likes to take familiar dishes in a new and unexpected direction, such as with his deconstructed chowder. Dolan pan-roasts black cod and serves it atop smoked bacon and a root vegetable chowder to create a dish that elevates the familiar flavors of traditional chowder.
“When I came to Red Star Tavern as the executive chef last year, I wanted to do food that was approachable but had a sense of attention to it,” Lane said. “Doing a play off of a chowder made sense to me. It’s comforting, yet you feel you are eating something special.”
