Cookaholics Bulletin Board

I would love a good recipe for cioppino. The last time I made it was a disaster, and the only good restaurant that I've found that does a great job on it is in Rochester.....

If you, or anyone else, would like to share, I'd be grateful.

KSS,

I'll have the one I used, with pictures, up on my blog this week. Let me know if you need it sooner for some reason.

I make bouillabaisse, but have never had cioppino (why are they both so hard to spell?).

What's the difference? Are they the same thing just with different seasonings and flavorings?

Ss,

They're different. Cioppino requires peppers, tomatoes, onions, garlic, wine and little or no stock. Bouillabaisse requires fennel, saffron, tomatoes, herbs, fish stock and pernod. Generally the seafood is different too; cioppino centers on saefood available in SF, and bouillabaisse on seafood of he Mediterranean.

Of course, both are hearty mixed seafood stews with tomato, so I imagine that a lot of people mix them up.

Thank you for that, but help a little more here. What would be "seafood available in SF" as opposed to "seafood of the Mediterranean"?

While I do always use the vegetables and flavorings you mentioned for bouillabaisse, I've always used whatever seafood was available. For 40 years in Michigan, Ohio and Ontario, that meant one thing. For the last 20 in Florida, that means something else. It wasn't always local, but it was always good. Have I missed the boat, so to speak? I always thought that bouillabaisse, like paella, was based on the hunt, the catch, or the leftovers of the day. Please enlighten me.

But I do see that the base you described, (peppers, onions, garlic, wine) does seem much more Italian, while fennel, fumet, herbs and pernod seem much more of a French flavor profile. I suppose an analogy might be paella and jambalaya - same concept, different execution?

Well, it is and it isn't. Yes, both stews ... as well as quite a few others ... are based on whatever the fishermen had available. However, both were created by fishermen of a specific place: Nice, San Francisco. And the seafood available there influences the dish. For example, Dungeness crab is a strong part of the flavor profile of cioppino, whereas bouillabaisse generally has no crab at all.

James Petersen has a list of around 15 mixed seafood stews, all somewhat different.

Would all of you please stop reminding me I live in a land-locked state.

Amy

Amy - you could get an aquarium . . .

Fortunately, planes fly the fresh stuff in, although I don't know how much gets to Telluride on a regular basis...albeit, its not as fresh as our friends on the coast get.

I buy my fish from the same purveyor we use at the restaurant, although it's very expensive, and they only do retail three days a week. Hard to fuel my sashimi fix...too dang expensive.