This impressive dinner party dish is absolutely delicious and is relatively simple to make. There are many different recipes for seafood stew/broth, this is an adaptation of a Jamie Oliver recipe from his book Return of the Naked Chef.
You can use mussels or clams or a mixture of both, plus a mixture of seafood - red mullet, monkfish, prawns, squid etc. In Jamie's recipe, he uses finely sliced courgettes, in this version I have used finely sliced fennel. The stew requires a generous amount of fresh herbs which I grow in my Click & Grow smart garden (see below). It is delicious served with toasted sourdough slices, I like to put one in the bottom of the bowl before adding the stew, it will soak up the delicious juices, plus a piece on the side together with Alioli, see recipe here.
If you would like to make this dish as a low carb dish, just leave out the sourdough toast.
Ingredients:
500g clams (or mussels or a mixture of both)
4 fillets of red mullet, cut into 2" pieces
1 small tail of monkfish cut into chunks
8 large shell-on king prawns (see below for cleaning tip)
1 medium squid tube, sliced (frozen is ok if fresh not available)
1 x 400g plum tomatoes
extra virgin olive oil
2 cloves of garlic, finely sliced
1-3 fresh red chillies, deseeded and sliced ( according to taste)
1 small bulb of fennel, thinly sliced
2 large glasses of white wine
Sea salt flakes & freshly ground black pepper
2 good handfuls of mixed fresh soft herbs ripped (such as basil, parsley, fennel, marjoram, see my smart garden page for details on Smart Gardens)
To serve:
8 Slices of toasted sourdough bread
Alioli (click here for recipe)
Method:
Place a large shallow pan over a high heat, add 4 glugs of extra virgin olive oil and add clams, cover with a lid and steam until just opened.
Remove clams to a bowl using a slotted spoon and set aside.
Extra virgin olive oil, 500g clams |
Add garlic, chillies and fennel to pan, stir for 1 minute or so to get the fennel to start to soften, add white wine, then squash tomatoes into the pan using your hands, stir to combine.
2 cloves of sliced garlic, 1-3 sliced fresh red chillies (according to taste) 1 small bulb thinly sliced fennel, 2 large glasses of white wine, 1 x 400g tin plum tomatoes |
Lay fish, squid & prawns on top of tomatoes & fennel mixture, turn heat to low and simmer for around 5 minutes, if necessary, cover with a lid to help all the fish cook through, prawns will probably take the longest, ensure that they are thoroughly pink.
4 red mullet fillets cut into 2" pieces, 1 small monkfish tail cut into chunks, 1 squid tube sliced, 8 king prawns (cleaned, see below) |
Return clams to pan and gently move the seafood around to distribute the clams evenly through the stew. Turn off the heat and allow to sit for two minutes with a lid on to warm the clams through . Season with salt & pepper and sprinkle over ripped herbs, pushing some of them gently into the broth with a spoon but leaving some on top.
Sea salt flakes, freshly ground black pepper, 2 good handfuls of soft herbs (basil, parsley, marjoram, fennel) ripped |
To Serve:
Place a piece of toasted sourdough in the bottom of the bowl and spoon the stew distributing the pieces of fish evenly, over the bread, finishing with ladles of the broth.
Add a good dollop of Alioli and a slice of toasted sourdough on the side.
8 slices toasted sourdough, Alioli (see here for recipe) |
Top tip: When cooking whole shell-on prawns, use scissors to remove legs from whole prawns, then to remove the black intestine which is gritty if left in the prawn, poke a cocktail stick into the top of the back of the prawn between 2 segments of shell, hooking it under the black vein and pull up, this will pull out the black intestine, in one piece.
Notes on where I get my ingredients:
All fish from K O'Connell Fishmongers, The English Market, Cork or any good fishmonger
Herbs & chillies grown in Click & Grow Smart Garden (see my page in menu above to read more about smart gardens) Use my discount code JACQUI10 for a 10% discount to purchase a Click & Grow smart garden or click on this link.
If you are interested in buying this or any of Jamie Oliver's books or any other cookbook, please click on the link. Thank you, Jacqui
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