New year, you’re perfect + easy cioppino
Don’t forget to eat.
Maybe you spent yesterday glued to Twitter, or texting your loved ones, or trying to get through the workday because you weren’t allowed to stop. Maybe you weren’t able to take care of yourself, to drink some water, to eat lunch, to sleep. But let us remind you, please, that you still need to eat.
Days like yesterday — and so many days like it — aren’t the only times when it can be hard to eat a meal. Right now, there’s an absolute overload of January diet content and pressure to make weight loss resolutions — the entire industrial complex around an obsession with a certain type of body. Instagram posts about burning off meals, about exercising enough that you deserve to eat. New year, new you.
But you always deserve to eat. Even if you had a hard day. Even if you had a big, special meal the night before. Even if it’s January. Even if your body image feels completely shot. Even if you missed your workout for a day or week or month or year. No matter what, you deserve nourishment and pleasure.
And might we suggest an alternate New Year’s resolution to weight loss? Waste reduction! The recipe below is a perfect example of how to use every part of the fish and take a step in favor of the environment. In this soup, the flesh of the fish is poached in a flavorful tomato broth, while the bones and head are turned into a delicious fumet (a concentrated stock). Since we buy whole fish and butcher them ourselves for each fry, we are left with plenty of heads and bones that we turn into fumet, freeze, and defrost throughout the weeks following to flavor our soups and stews.
You should be able to buy fish scraps from wherever you buy fish (a Whole Foods or a local fish market), but if not, we make enough fumet each week to go around! Moving forward, fumet (made with the same high quality fish that we fry each week) will be available for $4/pint at the fry. This helps put our waste to good use and saves you a trip down fish butchery Youtube!
We don’t have much to say this week except: Take care of yourself, take care of your loved ones, and remember to eat. You deserve it.
Easy cioppino
This soup is an easy interpretation of an Italian cioppino that comes together super quickly but tastes like it takes hours, and this fumet is a simplified version of the one Forrest and Niki learned working at Son of a Gun. It’s a great way to use up the scraps of our fish from the fry.
For the fumet
Makes 4–5 cups
Ingredients
2 pounds fish bones, heads, scraps, etc. (gills, blood, guts, etc. removed)
1 cup white wine
5 cups water
1 cup leek, diced (onion will work here in a pinch, but the aromatic qualities of leek really come through in a nice way)
1 cup celery, diced
½ cup carrot, diced
2 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
½ cup loosely packed parsley leaves and light stems
2 dried or fresh bay leaves
1 teaspoon black peppercorns
Directions
Soak the fish bones in ice water for 30 minutes. This will help draw out any remaining blood and impurities and will result in a cleaner looking and tasting end result.
Add the wine to a stock pot and bring to a boil to cook off the alcohol, then shut off the heat.
Add the fish bones, followed by water, and then everything else on top. Bring this to a boil and then reduce to a simmer.
Simmer for about 45 minutes, until the liquid has picked up some color and a light fish flavor (it should not taste bitter).
Strain out the solids. I find that the easiest way to do this is to use a spider or a large slotted spoon to scoop out all the large solids, and then ladle or pour the stock through a fine mesh sieve (I line mine with a paper towel for extra filtration) into a bowl. Let cool. If you’re making a larger batch, you should cool this in an ice bath to bring the temperature down as quickly as possible.
For the soup
Serves 3
Ingredients
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, divided
½ cup fennel, diced, fronds reserved
1 teaspoon red chili flakes
4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
½ cup white wine
1 ½ cup canned crushed tomatoes (or canned whole tomatoes, crushed by hand)
2 cups fish fumet
1 teaspoon fresh oregano, chopped
1 pound white fish, cubed (snapper, cod, bass, or any lean white fish)
Optional (but highly recommended): 1 pound assorted shellfish: clams, mussels, shrimp, crab claws
Salt
Parsley, picked and washed
Crusty bread, to serve
Directions
In a stock pot, heat 1½ tablespoons extra virgin olive oil over medium heat and add the fennel. Cook, stirring often, until slightly softened, about 2 minutes.
Add chili flakes and garlic and continue to cook until garlic is softened and begins to lightly brown, about another 2 minutes.
Add the wine to deglaze, and reduce for about 1 minute.
Add the tomatoes, fumet, and the chopped oregano, bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer. Continue to cook for around 30 minutes.
Add the fish (and shellfish, if using) and cook for around 5 minutes, until cooked. Season to taste with salt.
Serve in bowls, garnished with parsley and fennel fronds, a drizzle of olive oil, and bread for dipping.
If you make a recipe from our newsletter, please tag us in pictures! You can find us on instagram at @littlefish_echopark. If you’re in LA, our next fish fry is Sunday, 1/17.
Love,
Little Fish
P.S. The Little Fish team was lucky enough to be the first mixtape curators for GREEN BANANAS, a free, digital mixtape delivery service! Twice a month, subscribers will receive a Spotify link to a thoughtfully-considered and sequenced mixtape from an interesting and creative person (that’s us!).
The playlist we made includes the songs we dance to while we clean up after a fry (we love you, but you all create quite a mess in our kitchen). We hope you’ll listen the next time you have a messy dinner party or even a sloppy dinner for one (we’ve all been there) to clean up for. Sign up for their newsletter here and follow their instagram to get access to our playlist the minute it publishes.