It’s International Sherry Week and we’re over-the-moon with excitement! We’ve been selected by Sherry Wines as one of the top 20 bloggers to participate in their Blog for #SherryWeek competition. What’s more, Sherry Wines has sent us an amazing bottle of limited production Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 (González Byass) to pair with an original dish that we create.

So here it is: our California Coastal Seafood Stew! It’s a dish that embodies the essence of California cuisine, and together with the refreshing and complex Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 (González Byass), they form a perfect pairing of food with wine, both literally in their classic compatibility of flavor components, as well as figuratively, in their expressions of ingredient purity and internationality. 

California Cuisine: History and Fun Facts

Cioppino: A California Classic

This is one of California’s most famous dishes, and one that we can claim as ours, all ours. Helen Evans Brown, Helen Brown’s West Coast Cook Book (New York, NY: Bonanza Books, 1952), 173. 

Cioppino (pronounced chuh-pee-noh) is a seafood stew said to have been invented in the late 1800s in San Francisco, California by Italian immigrant fishermen, who made it with a mix of seafood leftover from the catch of the day. The cioppino we know today was built on this tradition, and while no two cioppinos are exactly alike, the dish typical consists of a tomato and wine based broth, onions and/or garlic, herbs, and of course, seafood. It is often served with sourdough bread, another San Francisco, California classic.

 California Cuisine:

Focus on Local and Fresh Ingredients

Although the term has different meanings to different people, California cuisine is known for its focus on local and fresh ingredients. Accordingly, our California Coastal Seafood Stew is intended to be made with locally sourced produce and seafood, including California Dungeness crab, which is in season now until about July. 

California Cuisine:

An International Cuisine

California is truly a melting pot of cultures. As described in more detail in this article posted on Delishably, from the Spanish missionaries who were the first to introduce their agriculture, livestock and culinary tradition to California, to the Mexican and European immigrants who came in waves after the California Gold Rush began in 1848, and later to the Asian immigrants in the early 1900s, the ethnic diversity of California has significantly influenced California cuisine and contributed to the rise of fusion cooking.

Our California Coastal Seafood Stew incorporates elements of fusion cooking in its use of ingredients and cooking styles from different traditional cuisines.

In addition to being inspired by the classic cioppino seafood stew, our California Coastal Seafood Stew includes ingredients commonly used in Zarzuela (a Spanish seafood stew which was also made popular in Cuba), such as saffron and a sofrito (sauté) base of olive oil, onion, red bell pepper and garlic. Similarly, the addition of carrots and celery to the onion sauté reflects a simple form of Italian soffrito.

Our California Coastal Seafood Stew also incorporates chili heat from the addition of crushed red pepper, which is common to Mexican cuisine. Finally, the broth for the stew is strained and further reduced,  techniques used to make French-style seafood bisques, and butter, a common ingredient in French cuisine, is added to silken the broth.

California Coastal Seafood Stew Recipe

2018-01-31 21:30:01

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Ingredients

1. For the Seafood Stew
2. • 3 tablespoons Spanish olive oil
3. • 2 large yellow onions, roughly chopped
4. • 1 red bell pepper, cored, seeded and roughly chopped
5. • 2 medium carrots, peeled and roughly chopped
6. • 2 celery ribs, roughly chopped
7. • 10 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
8. • shrimp shells from 1 pound of shrimp, well rinsed
9. • 2 tablespoons tomato paste
10. • 3/4 cup good quality dry sherry (we used Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 González Byass)
11. • 1 1/2 pounds fresh tomatoes, cored, seeded and roughly chopped
12. • 9 cups water
13. • 5 sprigs fresh thyme
14. • 5 sprigs fresh parsley (leaves only, about 2 tablespoons), plus more for garnish
15. • 2 fresh bay leaves
16. • large pinch of saffron (about 20 threads), soaked in 1/4 cup water for at least 5 minutes
17. • 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
18. • 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper
19. • 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt, plus more to taste
20. • 1 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper, plus more to taste
21. • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
22. • 16 mussels, scrubbed with beards removed
23. • 2 pounds steamed Dungeness crab legs, cut into 2-inch pieces (optional)
24. • 16 jumbo shrimp, deveined with shells on
25. For Serving
26. • sourdough or other crusty bread
27. • aioli or butter

Instructions

1. Step 1: In a large Dutch oven or large stock pot, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add the onions, bell pepper, carrots and celery and cook, stirring, until the onions are translucent (about 10 minutes). Add the garlic and cook for 2 minutes more.

2. Step 2: Add the shrimp shells and cook, stirring, until shells turn red (about 8-10 minutes).

3. Step 3: Add the tomato paste and cook, stirring, until paste is slightly darkened (about 2 minutes).

4. Step 4: Pour in the sherry and cook until it has evaporated, scraping the bits around the pan into the pot (about 9 minutes).

5. Step 5: Stir in the tomatoes, water, thyme, parsley, bay leaves, saffron (with the water), oregano, crushed red pepper, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, and then reduce the heat to maintain a low simmer and cook, stirring occasionally, for 1 hour.

6. Step 6: Remove the pot from the heat, pour the liquid through a fine mesh sieve into a large bowl, pressing the solids. Return the liquid to the pot, bring to a boil over medium-high heat, and then reduce the heat to maintain a low simmer, add the butter, adjust the seasonings as necessary, and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 10 minutes.

7. Add the mussels to the liquid and cook for about 2 minutes, and then add the crab and cook for 2 minutes more. Add the shrimp and cook for about 2-3 minutes or until shells are pink and mussels have opened. Discard any unopened mussels.

8. Step 7: Remove from the heat and serve immediately. Garnish with parsley. Serve with sourdough or other crusty bread to soak up the sauce, and aioli or butter.

Sweet and Sabroso https://www.sweetandsabroso.com/wordpress/

Fino Sherry and Seafood: A Classic Pairing

Every Sherry lover knows that Fino and seafood are a classically successful food and wine pairing, but why is that?   In order to answer that question, its helpful to appreciate some basic facts about Fino and Sherry Wines in general.

Sherry a fortified wine from Jerez de la Frontera (known also as Jerez) in AndalucÍa, Spain near the Atlantic coast, which comes in a variety of styles, including pale, dry Fino, to darker, fuller-bodied styles, such as Amontillado and  Oloroso, and sweet styles, such as Pedro Ximénez. In fact, the word Sherry is simply an Anglicanization of the word, Jerez. Manzanilla is essentially a Fino from the nearby seaside town of San Lúcar de Barrameda.

All dry Sherries, including Fino, are produced from the Palomino grape variety, as shown in the above photo during the harvest in Jerez de la Frontera, Spain. 

Sherry production is relatively complex and quite unique compared to classic still wine production. 

One unique element of Fino (and all Sherry production) is the Solera system, a process of gradually blending younger wines with older wines so that the final bottled product is a mixture of wines of varying ages (rather than one single vintage) and the wines produced are consistent in style from year to year.

Another unique element of nearly all Sherry production is flor, a naturally occurring yeast that forms on the surface of the wine. In particular, flor plays an important role in the production of Fino, which is aged exclusively under a veil of flor. Flor is not only responsible for imparting Fino’s characteristic aromas of almonds, herbs and dough, but it also protects the wine from oxidation and is responsible for its delicate texture and distinct dryness. And, it’s this dryness that gives Fino the impression of both saltiness and acid on the palate and helps mask its alcohol content (usually 15% alcohol by volume), making it a very food-friendly wine and incredibly compatible with seafood. 

Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 (González Byass) and California Coastal Seafood Stew: A Perfect Pairing

Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 (González Byass), together with our California Coastal Seafood Stew, form a perfect pairing of food and wine, both literally and figuratively.

Fino Sherries were historically filtered and clarified extensively to ensure the removal of flor and meet the expectations of consumers in certain markets who had become accustomed to the resulting pale, lightly flavored wines.

However, the Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 (González Byass) reflects a movement by Sherry producers toward production En Rama, a term (which literally means on the vine) used to describe Sherry that has been minimally filtered and clarified. As such, the Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 (González Byass), and our California Coastal Seafood Stew, are united in their expressions of local, fresh and pure  ingredients.

Additionally, according to the bottle label, Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 (González Byass) was bottled during the spring, when flor growth was at its thickest. This fact, combined with minimal filtration and clarification, results in a vibrant, gold-colored wine with more body than a typical Fino and pronounced aromas of yellow apple and dough as well as almond notes, allowing it to stand up to the rich flavors and buttery notes in our California Coastal Seafood Stew.

On the palette, in addition to hints of yellow apples, the Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 (González Byass) is very dry with a refreshing acidity and tangy, salty finish. These are are not only the components of a classic food-friendly Fino and seafood pairing, but they also allow the wine to pair impeccably with the disparate ingredients in our California Coastal Seafood Stew and prevent it from being overwhelmed by the acidity of the tomatoes and the chili heat from the crushed red pepper. In fact, the wine seems to almost cool and recalibrate the palate after every bite!

In conclusion, and perhaps most remarkably in light of the mission of International Sherry Week to unite Sherry lovers worldwide, the Tio Pepe Fino En Rama 2017 (González Byass), together with our California Coastal Seafood Stew, have an international breadth in their affinity for/with diverse foods and cultures. 

We hope you enjoy our California Coastal Seafood Stew paired with Tio Peppe Fino En Rama (González Byass). Please let us know what you think. We would love to hear from you!

Happy International Sherry Week!

!Salud!