So creamy and delicious
In classical French cooking, certain dishes elicit a feeling of comfort. One of those is Seafood bisque. Guess what: today is seafood bisque day. So creamy and delicious, it’s hard to pass up. Bisque is a bit of an enigma, at once fancy and simple comfort food. A staple on elevated dining menus for years, bisque has undergone some changes. When I started making it in the country club scene, it was an expensive dish. You’d crush the lobster shells, make a stock, thicken it with roux or rice, cream it with butter and heavy cream, and garnish with fresh lobster. Today, though, the term bisque refers to any creamy soup, including vegan versions (which seems a bit off since there is no real cream).
Now, we call creamy soups like tomato, squash, mushroom, and more: bisque. It makes it sound fancy. But, it’s not really the same as the original recipe. That’s not to say I disapprove. Sometimes you don’t want a heavy seafood soup. Think about it; if you live in Maine, you see lobsters every day. Some days, you just want to get away from them. They are, after all, related to cockroaches. There is a longstanding urban myth that Maine actually forbade prisons from feeding lobster to inmates every day as it is inhumane. Regardless of facts, having worked with a lot of lobsters over the years, you can develop an aversion after over-exposure.
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Why do we crave something so creamy and delicious?
As one may notice, Americans have a habit of being overweight. A lot of that stems from what we eat. When humans were developing as a species, we needed a lot of calories and fat to survive in harsh environments. Eating carbohydrates gives a boost to energy for short term adventures. Protein builds muscle mass, and fat helps deliver nutrients and provides insulation against the elements. But, we don’t live as our predecessors did. Our bodies still crave fats and carbs, despite our more sedentary lifestyle. The need to put in 10,000 steps is merely to burn off those extra calories since we aren’t actively trying to survive.
Add to that the availability of fatty, salty, sugary foods, we derive instant gratification, just because it’s there. Our brains want creamy and delicious because that’s our base instinct: survival. But, in excess, our natural cravings lead to the opposite. We become unhealthy, and hasten our own morbidity. Of course, we now live longer. But, that’s all part of our consumer driven society. We eat and drink all the bad stuff, then buy medical treatment to fix the damage and keep us coming back for more. In a way, it’s kind of like torture where you bring the victim to the verge of death, then nurse him back to health to continue the torture. Although, we see the nursing as the torture. I guess that makes us masochists.
So… getting back to deliciousness…
Well, that paragraph took a dark turn. But, we’re still talking about something delicious. Julia Child, famously said “The only time to eat diet food is while you’re waiting for the steak to cook.” She had a philosophy that eating well was living, and any attempts to curb that go against our very nature. Truly, watching everything you eat, counting calories, measuring portions, and policing your diet requires a lot of discipline and forethought. Not that that’s a bad thing. But, it doesn’t allow you to enjoy the moment. What’s the old saying? A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the hips? Eating tasty food is one of the pleasures of life. And, bisque is one of them.
But, it’s more complicated than that. If you choose a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle, that’s a good thing. It makes more sense from a global perspective as well as personal health. Animal products don’t digest well in human bodies. And, an acre of land can produce more sustainable nutrition than the same acre supporting an animal such as a cow. Think of it this way: the animals eat the vegetation, then we eat the animal. Why not just cut out the middleman and eat the plants? And, don’t worry about eating crap. There are plenty of high carb, sugar, and fat items available and marketed to vegetarians and vegans. Of course, one of those pleasures is bisque. How about Lobster mushroom bisque instead of the aforementioned cockroaches of the sea?
So many variations, so creamy and delicious
While today we celebrate Seafood bisque, it’s important to remember there are many options for other things called bisque. If it’s smooth and creamy, it’s a bisque. Staying with the seafood theme, we can make crab, lobster, or shrimp using the traditional method, since they all have exoskeletons to make a stock from. Or, you could go with making a fish stock from fish bones and incorporating some flesh into the final product for something like a salmon, halibut, or oyster bisque.
Then again, you might not love seafood that much to want to eat bowl after bowl of it. You may not even like seafood. That’s thing to. You could always go with a meat based bisque, which in the scheme of classical cuisine is kind of like a veloute. But a creamy chicken or beef bisque is perfectly acceptable as well.
But, where you can have the most fun experimenting with bisques is in the realm of vegetables. There are thousands of different vegetables to choose from (as opposed to just a few types of meat, commercially available). We mentioned mushrooms above. But, how about broccoli, cauliflower, Asparagus, even onion? You could go a little sweeter with pumpkin or squash, maybe beet or celeriac. You can even get into dessert bisques. How about a fresh berry, liche, Apple, pear, or even grape bisque.
So, bisque can serve multiple purposes. It can be an appetizer/hors d’oeuvre, first course, main course, or dessert. So, if you said “I don’t like bisque” you were wrong.
No limp Bisque Kits here
Some people think of soup as a boring per-cursor to a meal. That view demonstrates a lack of understanding of soup’s potential. Sure, it can be a simple thing. But, just like any other medium, it depends what you bring to the table. And, with colder weather upon us, soup can be a sustaining force. And, bisque is right up there with what we crave to spark warmth in our very hearts and bellies. Something so creamy and delicious is just what the doctor ordered. Of course, most doctors will tell you to lay off the cream and butter. The hell with that. Enjoy it while it’s hot.
For our seaside friends, a hardy bowl of Seafood bisque is certainly welcome. Sure, there are other seafood stews and soups, like bouillabaisse or cioppino. But, they rely on a variety of ingredients like tomato, garlic, saffron, and a variety of different seafoods to produce their flavor. For the pure essence of seafood in a heavy weather beating format, bisque wins hands down. While you can add in more ingredients, at base, It’s lobster or other crustaceans cooked to extract all the flavor, then creamed out. While this sounds simple, it does require a few steps to produce. But, if you’re a fan of lobster, it’s well worth the effort.
So, here are some recipes to help celebrate this classic dish and make your own variations. We include a vegetarian Beet bisque recipe if seafood isn’t your thing.
Bon apetit!
Northeastern Lobster Bisque
Ingredients
- 4 1# Lobsters
- 1 pint each Rough chopped onion, celery, and carrot
- 4 to 6 medium garlic cloves
- 2 Each Bay Leaves
- 6 Sprigs thyme, parsley, and tarragon
- 1 Cup Rough chopped tomato
- 2 Tbsp Paprika
- 1 cup Brandy or cognac
- 1 cup Sherry wine
- 2 gallons Water
- 1 Quart Heavy cream
- 1/2 cup cooked white rice for thickening may substitute roux
- 1/4 Cup Chopped parsley and chives to garnish
- olive oil for cooking
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Pull apart the lobsters, separate claws, knuckles, and tails from bodies. remove brain sacks from the bodies. Cut bodies into pieces. Crush them with a meat tenderizer or in a mixer with a paddle attachment.
- Heat a large pot or dutch oven over medium high heat with a coating of olive oil. Toss in the lobster bodies, stir and cook until red color develops.
- Add in the mirepoix vegetables and garlic, cook and stir until soft. Then stir in the paprika and herbs. Then add in the tomatoes
- Add the brandy and sherry, cook off the alcohol
- Cover with water, about 1 to 2 gallons. Bring to a Boil.
- Add in the lobster tails, claws, and knuckles. Cook for about 8 minutes. Remove them from the stock and shock in an ice bath. Lower the stock to a simmer.
- While the stock is simmering, remove the meat from the shells of the ice shocked lobster parts. Add those shells to the stock. Dice the meat to garnish the bisque later.
- Cook the broth for about 1 hour. The volume should be down to about a gallon, plus or minus.Strain the stock through a fine strainer into a pot to finish the soup.
- Bring the soup to a boil. Reduce by about 20%. Then whisk in the cream and rice to thicken. Season with salt and pepper. Remove from heat. place the bisque in a blender or use an immersion blender to make it smooth. Pass it through a fine chinois (strainer) for smoothness.
- Serve hot, garnish with lobster and herbs. You can also add other seafood if you like. A nice chive oil drizzle makes a colorful accent as well.
Ginger Golden Beet Bisque with Crispy Shallots
Ingredients
- 1 Lb golden beets, peeled and chopped
- 1 cup chopped sweet onion
- 2 Tbsp fine diced fresh ginger root
- 1 tsp peeled turmeric root
- 1/4 cup agave syrup
- 1 pint coconut milk
- 1 quart orange juice
- 1 each cinnamon stick
- 2 each cardamom pods
- 1 each bay leaf
- coconut oil to cook
- salt and pepper to taste
- For the crispy shallots
- 1/2 cup thin sliced fresh shallots
- 1/4 cup coconut milk
- 1 cup flour
- 2 Tbsp corn starch
- 1 Tbsp spice mix of cumin, coriander, turmeric, salt, and pepper
- Oil to fry the shallots
Instructions
- Heat coconut oil in a large pot over high heat. Add in Onions and ginger. Stir occasionally and cook until translucent.
- Add the beets. lower the heat to medium. Add in cinnamon stick, bay leaf, turmeric, and cardamom pods. Stir a couple times. Continue cooking about 5 minutes with intermittent stirring.
- Add in the agave and juice. Turn up the heat and bring to a boil, then back off to a simmer. Stir from time to time to prevent sticking.
- Reduce the volume of liquid by 1/2. Check to make sure the beets are cooked well. They should be soft.
- Add the coconut milk and return to a boil. reduce the liquid by 1/4.
- Remove from the heat and fish out the cinnamon stick, cardamom pods, and bay leaf.
- Blend the soup on high speed in a heavy duty blender. Season with salt and pepper.
- For the shallots: soak the thinly sliced shallots in coconut milk for about 30 minutes. You can do this before you make the soup.
- Mix the spices, flour, and cornstarch in a bowl.
- Heat frying oil in a heavy pot or fryer to about 350. Line a pan or plate with paper towels.
- Strain the milk from the shallot, but leave some on for binding. Toss the shallots in the flour mix. Shake off extra flour and put the shallots in the fry oil carefully. If you have a basket, use it, otherwise you will have to fish out the shallots with a spider or slotted spoon.
- When the shallots are golden brown, remove from the heat and allow to drain on the paper towels.
- Serve the bisque hot with the shallots as a garnish or on the side.