Considered by many to be the signature dish of San Francisco, Cioppino is a wonderful Italian seafood stew that is perfect for entertaining and holidays. Serve this with crusty sourdough bread to sop up all the delicious broth for a truly Californian dining experience!
One of the highlights of a trip to San Francisco for lots of people is to enjoy fresh seafood at one of the many great restaurants in the city.
We live in the Bay Area and I try to get into the city often for date night with my husband who works in San Francisco or to take our girls to meet up with him for lunch sometimes when they arent in school.
So imagine my chagrin when I was researching iconic foods that came out of California for the American Eats series I have been doing and realized that, despite all the fantastic restaurants Ive eaten at in the city, I had never tried cioppino! I decided to remedy that double quick.
As it turns out, cioppino is easy to make and so delicious! It can be made with almost any combination of seafood in a large soup pot, but whole Dungeness crabs in the shell, clams, shrimp, bay scallops, and mussels are classic options. Its a great special occasion recipe for the holidays or dinner parties.
Almost every seafood restaurant of note in San Francisco has cioppino on its menu. It was created here in the late 1800s by Italian immigrant fishermen from the Genoa region of Italy who lived and worked in the North Beach section of San Francisco by the Bay.
The story goes that when fishermen would return from an unsuccessful day of fishing out on the water, they would go around the docks and other fishermen would chip in a little something from the days catch to the pot—a crab, some mussels, or a fish. There was an understanding that they too would have days in the future when they would come home empty-handed and need to rely on their fellow fishermen as well. It was a community effort.
Cioppino is traditionally made with the freshest seafood possible in a thin broth made from tomatoes, herbs, and white wine. The catch of the day from the San Francisco Bay is usually a combination of Dungeness crab, clams, bay scallops, shrimp, squid, mussels, and fish.
Bowls of cioppino are served with plenty of fresh San Francisco sourdough bread that is dipped into the sauce to sop up the rich, flavorful broth.
The word cioppino is Italian, now this Genoese dialect, ciuppin, which means little soup ,for a fish stew.
How to Make San Francisco Cioppino Seafood Stew
- Prepare the broth. Melt the butter over medium heat in a large dutch oven, then add the onion, fennel, garlic, and parsley, sautéing until the onions are soft. This will take about 10 minutes.
- Add seasoning. Add the garlic, basil, salt, thyme, oregano, and red pepper flakes, and sauté for 2 minutes longer.
- Add wet ingredients and bay leaves. Add the white wine, crushed and diced tomatoes, fish stock, and bay leaves, then cover and reduce the heat to medium-low.
- Cook. Simmer for 30 minutes so the flavors can blend. While the broth simmers, prepare the crab by removing the crab legs from the body (if not already done for you) and using a nutcracker to crack the shells (leave the meat in the shell) so that the meat can be easily removed once the cioppino is served.
- Add seafod. Increase the heat to medium and add the clams and mussels to the broth and cook for 5 minutes until they start to open. Then add the crab legs and cook for another minute, followed by the shrimp and scallops. Finally, lay the chunks of cod on top of the broth and cover, and cook for 3-5 minutes until the mussels and clams are open, the shrimp curl, and the scallops are just firm.
- Serve. Ladle the cioppino into large bowls and garnish with chopped fresh parsley and basil. Serve with warm, crusty sourdough bread! Have plenty of napkins, extra bowls for shells, nutcrackers, and tiny forks on hand for the crab.
Some say that the name “cioppino” actually comes from the idea of “chipping in,” although the more likely answer is that it is derived from the name of a Genoese fish stew called cioppin, which is very similar to the cioppino that is so popular in San Francisco today.
Serve cioppino stew in a large bowl with a side of crusty bread like my Garlic and Rosemary Artisan Bread or Garlic Bread, in Homemade Bread Bowls for a fancy presentation, or with Homemade Croutons for an added bready crunch. Alternatively, you can serve it over another kind of carb like pasta or White Rice to make it a fuller meal. Make an extra bowl available for people to discard the inedible shells in.
I would recommend making fish stews fresh every time, rather than making them and storing them for the next day.
- Buy fresh. Buy the freshest seafood available to you for making San Francisco cioppino. Whole Foods is one of my go-to sources for good seafood, but Asian markets can also be a good, economical source of fresh seafood as well. Depending on where you live, there might also be a good fish market or fishmonger at your local farmers market that you could go to for the freshest seafood possible.
- Its messy. Fair warning that authentic cioppino is typically served with the crab and other shellfish still in their shells, which means youre in for some hands-on, messy eating. But I think thats part of the fun for an informal gathering with friends who appreciate good seafood. Just be sure to have lots of napkins on hand!
- Stock. If you cant find fish or seafood stock, you could use chicken stock with a small can of clam juice instead.
- Wine. Replace the white wine with more stock, if you arent comfortable cooking with wine.
If you are planning a trip to San Francisco in the future, be sure to check out this 3-Day San Francisco itinerary for all the best places to see!
- Stock. Replace all or part of the fish or seafood stock with the same amount of chicken stock along with a small bottle of clam juice instead.
- Dungeness Crab. If Dungeness crab is not available, you could use snow crab, blue claw, stone crab claws, or even Alaskan King crab. Also, you could just use crab meat instead of the legs and body, which would certainly make this cioppino easier to eat, although it is such a fun presentation to have the crab legs.
- Fennel. If you cant find fennel bulbs, dont substitute them for fennel seeds. They are quite different in flavor and substance. The bulb is best substituted for the same amount in celery or bok choy plus a small amount of fennel seeds. For example, for this recipe, 1 fennel bulb will need about ½ lb celery and ½ teaspoon of fennel seeds as a substitution.
- Turn up the heat. Add some chili pepper to the mix for some added spice.
More Hearty Soup Recipes
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Cioppino Recipe – San Francisco Cioppino – A Spicy Fish Stew Recipe
FAQ
What does cioppino mean?
When did cioppino originate?
Why is cioppino so closely associated with San Francisco?
What is cioppino in San Francisco?
It is an Italian-American dish and is related to various regional fish soups and stews of Italian cuisine. Cioppino is traditionally made from the catch of the day, which in San Francisco is typically a combination of Dungeness crab, clams, shrimp, scallops, squid, mussels and fish, all sourced from the ocean, in this case the Pacific.
What seafood goes in cioppino?
Cioppino is a seafood stew that was created by Italian immigrant fishermen in San Francisco in the late 1800s. They used whatever was in the “catch of the day”. It’s quite probably a form of the Ligurian cacciucco (seafood stew). So most seafood can go in your cioppino, such as fish, shellfish, squid, shrimp, scallops and crab.
What is cioppino based on?
Similar to many fish-based stews found all over the Mediterranean such as Tuscan cacciucco or French bouillabaisse, cioppino recipes include infinite variations of seafood in a tomato and wine broth. True to its San Francisco origins, cioppino is traditionally served with grilled sourdough bread for dunking. What is in Cioppino?
What’s in cioppino?
Since the primary ingredient is “catch of the day,” you get a lot of variety with cioppino, but if it’s the real deal, it’s probably filled with fresh fish caught from the Pacific Ocean. Usually, this means clams, crab, shrimp, mussels, or scallops.