Here's a festive-looking all-seafood Italian cousin of the famous Spanish Paella. The mix of shellfish gives it a great visual presentation, and you get a lot of flavor because you can enjoy the flavors of the individual shellfish, and the taste as they mingle in the risotto.
Yield
4 Servings
Preparation time
1 hour
Ingredients
4 TOlive oil
5 cFish Stock
1 clvGarlic (crushed)
6Littleneck clams
6Mussels
6Scallops
6Large Shrimp (shelled and deveined)
1Onion (chopped)
1⁄2 cDry White Wine
2 TTomato Paste
2 carborio rice (or Carnaroli rice)
1 TParsley, Flat-Leaf (chopped)
Instructions
On a back burner, bring the stock to a boil.
On a front burner, in a pot with a cover and big enough to hold the clams and mussels, steam the clams with a little water for 5 minutes, then add the mussels and the wine, cover and cook until the clams and mussels are all open, then remove the clams and mussels to another plate and turn down the heat.
On your favorite burner, in a pan deep enough to hold the risotto and everything else, heat the oil and cook the garlic until it starts to brown, then discard the garlic.
In the same pan, sear the scallops a few minutes on each side, until done. Do the same with the shrimp, then move the shrimp and scallops to another plate.
Cook the onion over moderate heat until translucent in the same pan. You may need a little more oil.
Add the rice and stir it around until all the grains are coated with the flavored oil.
Stir in the wine that you cooked the mussels and clams in, and let it evaporate, then stir in the tomato paste. At this point you can remove that pan and bring the stock forward.
Add two ladlefuls of hot stock to the rice and stir it well. Let it cook down to the level of the rice, stirring constantly.
Add more stock, a ladleful at a time, each time the liquid gets below the top of the rice.
When the last of the stock goes in, stir it all very well to be sure nothing is sticking to the bottom of the pan. Arrange the scallops, shrimp, clams, and mussels, sprinkle with parsley and maybe some black pepper, and cover. Reduce the heat and let the last of the stock steam the shellfish a little to warm them up again. Serve hot.
Notes
For this, you'll need three burners, a pot for stock and two pans plus two plates for the cooked shellfish, so you can reduce stress by planning ahead!