A Seafood Stew For Hurried Holidays

About author / Amy Powell

World traveler; gourmet 30 minute meals; lover of exotic ingredients; winner on FoodTV's Chefs vs City; graduate French Culinary Institute. Her recipes will tantalize your taste buds.

I was watching a re-run of Modern Family this week, the one where the family decides to celebrate “Express Christmas” on December 16th, and it got me thinking about the lengths we sometimes go to in order to be with family at the holidays. In the episode the extended, lovably dysfunctional family realizes they actually won’t all be together on Christmas Day, so they rush to put together a traditional holiday gathering, complete with turkey, in just four hours on December 16th.

Now, I haven’t heard of anyone in real life trying to assemble a holiday feast in such a short period of time, but every year I do hear about the extreme measures friends go to in order to be with family at the holidays. Sometimes this means flying across country to celebrate with both sides of a couple’s family, complete with a Seven Fishes feast in an Italian neighborhood of Brooklyn followed by a full traditional turkey dinner a couple of days later in Chicago. It might mean choosing to drive in the middle of the night to make a car trip from Northern California to Southern California just to avoid the daylight holiday traffic pileups.

There is nothing wrong with any of these activities, it is just that after so much travel, the last thing anyone wants to do is spend all day in the kitchen, or have someone else do so, then sit down to a heavy meal. Some people travel for food (I have been known to on occasion) but the extreme travel we go to on the holidays has nothing to do with an elaborate meal on arrival and everything to do with spending time with family. So particularly for that night when everyone rolls in the door exhausted and travel weary, a lighter, easier dinner may be in order.

I envision a big pot of soup, something hearty and quick to assemble but still festive. A big seafood stew or chowder, something like a bouillabaisse or cioppino would do the trick. A tomato-based broth would keep it light, leaving room for cookies and pie later on. A collection of seafood will make it special; crab legs, mussels, clams, snapper, even salmon can be added to the mix. Find enough sea creatures to mix in and you could even call it a Stew of the Seven Fishes, after the Italian-American tradition of eating seven fish dishes on Christmas Eve.

All that is needed for this simple stew to be made in mass quantity are some simple veggies like onion, celery, garlic, maybe fennel, a good mix of locally available seafood, a can of tomatoes, fish broth or clam juice, and a few herbs for seasoning. This pot can be made as big or small as you want it depending on the size of the crowd will be that night. If people can’t all sit down together, no need to worry, the stew will keep just fine on a low simmer on the stove for guests to dip into as the arrive.

Part of what I love about Modern Family is that I can see a bit of my own family in that crazy bunch. But if I’d had a say in Express Christmas, I would have advised my favorite TV family to forget about a turkey dinner in four hours and cook up something equally special but far easier, say a seafood stew, to leave more time for what they really wanted- family. But then again, assembling a Christmas turkey dinner in four hours sure made for funny TV.

Serves/Makes: 4

• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 medium onion
• 1/2 large fennel bulb
• 1 celery rib
• 3 cloves garlic
• 2 cups fish broth or clam juice
• 1 pinch saffron (optional)
• 2 plum tomatoes diced plus their juices
• OR
• 1 cup chopped canned tomatoes
• 2 medium Yukon Gold potatoes
• 1 sprig thyme
• 1 pinch chili flakes
• black pepper
• 1 pound medium to firm fish such as snapper, hake, or cod
• 12 clams such as Little Neck or Manila
• 1 pound medium shrimp
• 1/4 cup chopped parsley
• fennel fronds