Seafood Bisque
If you ever have any shell fish left over from something, or you just happen to find a good deal on a small amount of seafood, a bisque is a terrific way to use it and not have it get lost in the middle of some large, complicated dish. A bisque is nothing more than a cream soup, flavored with whatever ingredient it is named for: lobster, crab, shrimp, whatever you have.
The first time I ever made this, I was visiting my father. He had just come from a friend’s place, and had been given a small bag of crab legs and some crayfish. We decided to add scallops to the mix, and managed to find a good deal at the local grocery. They were fresh-water scallops, and a bit smaller than the salt-water variety, which made them a bit easier to use in a soup.
A bisque is generally a two-pot operation: one for the vegetable base; the other for the white sauce, and eventually the entire soup. With practice you can get both pots going at the same time, but there is no reason you cannot prepare the vegetables ahead of time, and prepare the white sauce and cream base afterwards.
Both crab and crayfish are very soft, and would obviously disintegrate in the soup, but the scallops would stay intact. Therefore, I decided it would be a good idea to carmelize them a bit to get some extra flavor and texture. (If you haven’t done so already, it would be a good idea to read up on carmelization now for some background info.) Simply put, I gently placed two or three dried, salted scallops at a time on a lightly oiled pan on medium heat. The scallops stuck to the pan at first, but once they came loose they had a beautiful golden finish that was very tasty. After both sides were done, the finished scallops went on a plate with paper towel while the remaining ones were being carmelized.
When the scallops were all done, I started on the vegetables. As with most soups I started with some aromatics: in this case, onions, green pepper and celery, all chopped very finely. These went in the same pan as the scallops, but this time with butter, and at a lower temperature in order to “sweat” them, which helps release the flavors. Salting your veggies when sweating them will also add a great deal of flavor, as it helps release the moisture from within the cells, which is where all the tasty stuff is.
In the second pot I melted 2 tablespoons of butter to begin my white sauce. I slowly added in two tablespoons of flour, allowing the two ingredients to become a thick paste. Taking the pot off the heat, I slowly added about a cup of milk a bit at a time to the butter-flour mixture, making sure to stir the mixture to smoothness before adding any more milk. Once the milk was completey mixed in, the white sauce was done, and it was time to assemble the remaining ingredients.
I added the vegetables, the scallops, crab and crayfish, about a cup and a half of cream (half and half is best) and a bit of salt and pepper. This was allowed to simmer for a while, and was finally topped with some chopped parsley. The result was absolutely delicious, and was filling enough on its own to be an entire meal. However, a smaller amount would have been terrific as a starter as well.
There are a lot of things you can do to vary this basic recipe, but don’t get too fancy or use too many ingredients. The idea of a bisque is to allow the cream base to carry the gentle flavor of the seafood, and to coat your tongue with its thick, subtle texture. If you want a cream soup with lots of ingredients, I suggest chicken or turkey instead of seafood, as they can stand up to bolder flavors more readily. Also, don’t add anything too acidic, such as vinegar, as it can curdle the milk and cream, and that’s not a pleasant thing in a soup.
Yours in Good Taste,
Erik Christensen