Cioppino

What is Cioppino?

One might start to ask when seeing it on a restaurant menu or when someone throws that word around just to impress others (as in what I am doing right now).

There are just as many versions of how the word originated as are recipes.

Some might argue the word was a corrupted pronunciation of "ciuppin" (to chop) from the Ligurian dialect of the port city of Genoa, Italy. (Are you impressed yet....) However true it might be, but my favorite one still is:

An Italian fisherman (with his heavy accent) at San Francisco Fisherman's Wharf crying out at the end of the day to ask all his paisans to "chip in now?" for a cook out. His fellow countrymen would toss in a crab, a piece of fish fillet, clams, calamari, prawns, scallops...etc. into the bucket while it was being passed around at the dock.

At any rate, we know quite certain it started in San Francisco, my favorite city by the bay: where I often left my heart (as in the song), my boat and my daughter Jessica in. So I feel it is appropriate for me to share my version of Cioppino as my first recipe in "Frank Cook".

Many of my friends and family have helped me shop, prepare and eat this dish for years. Cioppino, in short, is a seafood stew like the French Bouillabaisse. It starts with a tomato base and is built up with fresh herbs and spices and finished with fresh seafood.

As all my friends know, I am a Cantonese, passionate, untrained, home chef. These four elements make me an interesting, if not, quite dangerous cook. Being Cantonese, I will eat anything that swims in the water that doesn't have a motor, lives on land that doesn't have an engine or flies in the air that doesn't have a propeller. I am passionate with my cooking as every dish is a labor of love. My untrained cooking skills make me willing to try anything however unconventional. As a home chef, it means I don't need a license and am exempt from local Health authorities. One might not know what the "outcome" coming out of my kitchen might be but I can safely say, I still have all my friends and family (other than those who died of natural causes).

I like simple cooking. With that I mean using fresh, inexpensive (in season) ingredients with easy and fast steps. This will be the basis for my future postings on this blog. The goal is to share my cooking style so one can cook a healthy, nutritious and tasty meal in about 30 minutes. So here is how I make my "chip in now":

Frank’s Cioppino
4 cloves of minced garlic
4 tablespoons olive oil
¼ cup fresh dill
2 - 28oz cans tomato sauce
1 cup chopped tomato – fresh or canned
½ cup white wine
Salt and pepper to taste
1 lb. cod or snapper fish fillet ( cut into 1 in. chunks)
3 large fresh Dungeness crabs (cleaned and quartered w/claws cracked)
1 lb prawns (with shell on, deveined by cutting open the back)
½ lb scallops
½ lb calamari
1 dozen clams or mussels
Heat the olive oil and garlic in a stewing pot, slowly browning the garlic, add tomato sauce, white wine, chopped tomatoes, dill, fish fillet, salt and pepper. Bring to the boil and turn the heat to low. Simmer for at least 30 minutes.
Bring broth to a boil with high heat and add clams, crabs, and prawns to the pot. Keep covered for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add scallops and calamari and continue cooking until the calamari curls up.
Serves 6-8 people over long cut pasta (spaghetti, linguine or fettuccine)