Community Cookbook Cuisine: Oven Roasted Cioppino

Have I mentioned how much I lurv community cookbooks? Oh so much, the more cream of mushroom soup the better.

Real cookbooks from real chefs typically have a handful of excellent recipes and a lot of filler. Wolfgang Puck made his reputation on a couple of high end pizzas, and then his editor prolly demanded a hundred more recipes and so his cookbooks are filled with silly dishes NO ONE would ever even try.

Breakfast Steak with Red Bell Pepper Relish anyone? Anyone? Buehler?

Community cookbooks are the exact opposite.

Home cooks share their best recipes--their go-to recipes for family gatherings and potluck dinners--the ones that never fail to get gobbled down--the ones that all the other ladies insist on getting the recipe for--the ones of which they are most proud.

How can a busy mother not love these books? I've got to get dinner on the table for seven most every night of the week, and I do not live in Alaska and I cannot go out after an easy day of pontificating on the Fox News and shoot a moose or two, so I am typically looking for a recipe that is quick and will pacify the hungry hordes.


This cookbook comes from my parents' Florida tennis community of Sea Oaks, aka Boca Vista Del Mar Phase III.

The first recipe that caught my eye was for a recipe for Cioppino that cooks in the oven--about a million years ago I made a Cioppino recipe for my husband and my inlaws when then came to visit our first home, and it took 3 days and a hundred bucks--and even back then, when I had three days and a hundred bucks that recipe was not nearly worth the effort and I've never made it since.

This recipe was more than worth the wait.

Next time I make this, and there will be a next time, I'll add a thinly sliced bulb of fennel and a couple of diced carrots to the vegetable mix, but otherwise it was perfection.

Oven Roasted Cioppino
Adapted from the recipe by Abby McInnis
Sea Oaks Serves
A Community Cookbook

To serve 6

3 ribs celery, diced
1 large onion, diced
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1/2 cup olive oil
4 cloves garlic
1 cup dry white wine
1 cup seafood stock or bottled clam juice (LOVE the Bar Harbor brand)
grated rind and juice of 1 orange
1/2 teaspoon seasoned salt (Lowry's)
4 cloves minced garlic
3 pounds chowder fish (the bits and ends from the fish counter)
or 3 pounds of a combination of cod, haddock, scallops and shelled shrimp
Handful of fresh parsley, minced

1 loaf of crusty bread for sopping

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
In a large, covered dutch oven or soup pot saute the celery, onion and red pepper in the olive oil for 2-3 minutes over medium heat until the vegetables are limp and glossy.
Add the garlic and saute for another minute, being careful not to burn the garlic.
Add the white wine orange zest and the clam broth and bring to a simmer.
Add the fish and return to a simmer. Cover the pot and place it in the preheated oven for about 30 minute, until the fish is cooked through.
Squeeze the orange juice into the pot and garnish with the minced parsley.

Serve in shallow bowls with crusty bread.