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ITALIAN RECIPES

Quick, Easy Fish

Mussel or Clam soup with Tomato Sauce

Ingredients:

5 1/2 pounds (2.5 k) live hard-shelled clams or mussels
1/2 cup (125 ml) olive oil
2 cloves garlic
1 pound (500 g) canned plum tomatoes (or peeled, blanched, and seeded fresh plum tomatoes)
Pepper; no salt.

Preparation:

Purge the shellfish by soaking them overnight in salted water.
Drain them well in a colander. Mince abundant parsley, chop the tomatoes, and grind some pepper in your peppermill.

Set the oil to heat in a large skillet with the garlic, and while it's turning gold pour the tomato mixture over the shellfish.

Once the garlic is golden, add the shellfish in one fell swoop and cook over a brisk flame, fishing the shellfish out and removing them to a platter as they open. Once all the shellfish have opened, cook the sauce down if it's too thin -- you don’t want something thick, but it shouldn't be really thin either -- and return the shellfish to the pot.

Cook a minute or two more, and serve, with toasted bread, over pasta, or with a salad.
If one of the shellfish fails to open upon being cooked, do not eat it! It was already dead when it went into the pot, and eating it could make you quite sick.

Mixed Fried Seafood

Ingredients:

Lots of fish (see below for kinds)
Oil for frying
Lemon wedges
Flour, or, if you want, batter (see below)

Preparation:

... a fritto di paranza, which is just very small (2 inch long including head and tail) fish rolled in flour, fried, and served with lemon wedges.

You eat them heads and all (unless they're a little larger than normal), and purists frown on cleaning the fish because the intestines provide a slightly sharp flavor contrast. I prefer my fish cleaned and you may well too. But if the heads are small they're pleasingly crunchy, and the tails are perfect handles.

In any case, to make a fritto di paranza to serve six you'll need about 2 pounds (1 k) of assorted tiny, minnow-sized fish. To make a more standard fritto di mare you'll need 2 1/2 pounds (1.2 k) of mixed small fish, including fresh sardines and anchovies, baby squid, baby cuttlefish, small crabs, scampi and other assorted crustaceans, reef mullet and tiny whiting, sole, and whatever else your fishmonger suggests.

You'll also need 2 cups flour for rolling the fish, abundant oil (it's best to fry in several pots so what fries first will still be hot when the last things are cooked), salt, several lemons cut into wedges, and sprigs of fresh parsley to serve as garnish.

Wash, clean and pat the fish dry. You can bone the minnows, opening up like a book to remove the spines, but it's not indispensable.
If you are using something like sole, filet it. Cut away the mouth parts of the squid and cuttlefish, remove the innards without breaking the ink sacks (you can use them to make a risotto with squid ink), and remove the bones from the cuttlefish (give them to a friend who keeps caged birds).

Cut the bodies of the mollusks into rings, and keep the tentacles together in bunches. Shell or don't shell the crustaceans depending upon how hard their shells are.
Coat the fish thoroughly with flour and fry it, beginning with the mollusks and then the crustaceans, followed by the larger and then the smaller fish. As the fish rise to the surface and turn golden remove them with a strainer and drain them on absorbent paper.

Transfer the fish to a platter, season it with salt, garnish it with parsley, and serve it with the lemon wedges and a chilled bottle of Trebbiano di Romagna or Castelli Romani. Or, if you want to splurge, a nice Gavi di Gavi.

Tuna Palermo Style

Ingredients:

2 1/4 pounds (1 k) fresh tuna, cut into 3/4-inch slices
1 pint (500 ml) dry white wine
The juice of 2 lemons
3 cloves garlic, slivered
Parsley, minced
Several leaves fresh sage and the leaves stripped from an 8-inch (20 cm) sprig of rosemary
2 tablespoons olive oil
Salt & pepper to taste

Preparation:

Marinate the tuna slices in the wine for an hour, turning them frequently. Drain them well and dredge them in oil seasoned to taste with salt and pepper, then stick them with the garlic sliver, rosemary leaves, and pieces of sage leaf. Grill the fish, brushing it often with the marinade and turning it several times; figure about 10 minutes in all.

While the fish is cooking stir the minced parsley and the lemon juice into the marinade, and serve it along side the fish.
The wine? More of the same used in the marinade. I'd definitely go with something that is not oaky here.

Sole Miller's Style

Ingredients:

4 1/2-pound (200 g) soles; have your fishmonger filet them for you.
1/2 cup (100 g) unsalted butter -- clarify 1/3 cup per the instructions below
3 tablespoons flour
The juice of a half a lemon
1 tablespoon minced parsley
Salt
A lemon, cut into thin wedges, for garnishing

Preparation:

If you decide to clarify your own butter, set 1/3 cup unsalted butter to warm over a very gentle flame in a small pan, and when it separates into solids that settle and a clear part, carefully skim off the clear part, discarding the residue that's left behind.

Once you have your butter, wash the filets, pat them dry, and flour them. While you're doing this heat the clarified butter until hot but not smoking, and then cook the filets, turning them once; they should be a beautiful golden color. In terms of cooking time, if the filets are a half-inch thick (.75 cm), figure about 3 minutes per side (see note below).

While you are cooking the fish, heat the remaining butter until it browns to a pleasing hazelnut hue. Do not let it burn.
Remove the fish to a heated platter, sprinkle them with the lemon juice, and dust them with the parsley.

Pour the browned butter over the fish, garnish with the lemon wedges, and serve at once.
James Beard suggests a "brisk" white wine, and Gavi (especially La Scolca) will be perfect.

Buon appetito!

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