There is a southern Italian tradition of having seven fishes for dinner on Christmas Eve. I am still unclear to the significance seven fishes specifically. Some explanations are that it symbolizes the 7 sacraments or the 7 days of the week, but there doesn’t seem to universal agreement on this. Recently, I’ve been curious to try the tradition myself.
My friend Sam, who is Indian, doesn’t have any personal traditions around Christmas Eve, so she was into following the ritual, especially since her husband is of Italian descent and she loves fish. Last year when we cooked up the feast, it was extremely elaborate with multiple courses all in involving fish – the most involved being a salt baked sea bass. This year as she has a young baby and I was working on Christmas Eve, we decided to try and make it simpler. Our brilliant shortcut was to make cioppino, an Italian fish stew. I found a recipe that had a total of 6 fishes in it, so all we needed was one more fish dish.
The weekend before Christmas I made a trip to the Italian market in Philadelphia. I can’t say the food is sourced locally or sustainably at the market place, but it sure is an authentic experience to the City. My favorite shop is Claudio’s. The place, especially the smell of the cured meats, brings me back to living in Venice. Many other people had the same idea I did, as the line both to order and pay snaked through the entire store and backed out the front door. We decided to go for it as we had already made the trip down there. It was an experience – all types of people were there from housewives from New Jersey, a young Italian couple, to food lovers like me. I knew they carried marinated fresh anchovies which are a thousand times better than the canned ones. Anchovies on toast would constitute our seventh fish. In addition to anchovies I bought mushroom bullion cubes, panettone, Italian marscapone and ladyfingers (for making tiramisu). I was happy as a clam.
Once we had the seven fish determined, the rest of the menu was figured out quickly.
Appetizers: sautéed mushrooms with marscapone on polenta rounds + anchovies on bruschetta with an herb paste
Salad: mixed greens with fennel, pomegranite seeds and oranges
Second Course: Cioppino
Dessert: Assorted cookies and gelato
Sam agreed to take on the cioppino and my mom handled the dessert. Making the ravioli filling a day in advance was helpful too. I was thrilled to have the Market on Main Street in Manayunk finally open and even more impressed that they carried everything I needed for the meal – except for wonton wrappers for ravioli. Too bad the shop wasn’t there the four years I was living in Manayunk!
The appetizer course was pretty easy to assemble. I found a cylinder of pre-made polenta at the market so all I had to do was slice it, then brush them with olive oil before broiling them in the oven until golden. While the rounds were cooking, I sautéed and assortment of mushrooms – chantrelles and baby shitakes – in olive oil, butter, garlic, a dash of wine, and some salt. Towards the end, I added chopped thyme and sage. When the rounds were browned, I spread marscapone on them and topped it with the sautéed mushrooms. They were a big hit.
For the anchovy toasts, I bought Italian green sauce (herb paste) in a tube from the market, spread that on bruschetta toasts and topped with a marinated anchovy (or not for the vegetarians in the crowd).
I did a little research online for various ideas around squash ravioli and walnut cream sauces. Here’s what I cobbled together. For the filling, roast a medium butternut squash and a sweet potato. The latter helps absorb some of the water in squash in addition to adding flavor. Next scoop out the cooked innards into a bowl and mash together with some sautéed shallots or onions (about 1/2 cup), nutmeg, a pinch of cayenne, and salt. Brush each side of wonton wrapper with egg yolk and place a spoonful of filling in the middle and pinch closed the edges. When ready cook in salted, boiling water for 3 to 4 minutes.
For the sauce, I toasted 1 1/2 cups of walnuts and then ground them coarsely in a food processor. In a sauce pan heat a stick of butter with 3/4 cup of cream and some salt and pepper,. Cook down at a low heat. When thickened slightly, add the walnut powder, a pinch of nutmeg, and some cracked pepper. Serve over the cooked ravioli with grated parmesan on top. The dish is very rich, so 3 or 4 raviolis per person would be fine for a big dinner like this. The recipe will make enough for 40 -50 ravioli, so you can freeze the uncooked ravioli for future quick meals.
The recipe for the cioppino came from All Recipes online. Sam read through the reviews and incorporated some of the suggestions, like adding clam juice and cooking the crab and cod in bigger chunks so they don’t break down too much in the soup. We were all pretty full by the time this course arrived, so there were certainly leftovers. It was delicious and would make a great, hearty meal all on it’s own!
Maybe next year I’ll try and simplify even further.
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