Every coastal region of Italy has a seafood stew. Tuscany— or more specifically the port town of Livorno—has cacciucco (ka-CHOO-ko). While the word is fun to pronounce, the dish is even more pleasurable to eat.

I yearn for cacciucco in the spring. It was in primavera that I first tasted cacciucco at Trattoria Benvenuto in Florence and I haven’t been the same since.

Some say the dish must have at least five types of seafood to correspond to the five Cs in the word. The more fish and shellfish, the better the flavor. And select good quality red wine and artisanal quality bread with good texture to soak up the amazing broth.

Choose the freshest fish available. Use one type or as many as three or four, to comprise 2 pounds. Sea bass, monkfish, cod, halibut, swordfish, shark, tilapia, turbot, catfish, or red snapper are all good choices.

As for the shellfish, in this recipe, I’m using littleneck clams and shrimp but baby calamari, octopus, mussels, or scallops may be substituted.

Cacciucco

Serves 6 to 8

3/4       cup olive oil
1          large red onion, coarsely chopped
4          large cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2    teaspoons dried crushed red-pepper flakes
1           cup dry red wine
1        can (28 ounces) crushed plum tomatoes
1/2       cup minced fresh flat-leaf parsley, divided
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
24       littleneck clams
24                medium or large unpeeled shrimp
2 to 2 1/2         pounds mild white-fleshed fish fillets, cut in 2-inch chunks
3          cups cold water
6 to 8 thick slices Rustic Bread, toasted

Heat the oil in a 6-quart Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onion, garlic, and pepper flakes. Cook, stirring occasionally, for 10 minutes or until soft. Add the wine. Increase the heat to medium-high. Cook at a brisk simmer for 5 minutes or until the wine no longer smells of alcohol. Add the tomatoes, all but 2 tablespoons of the parsley, and salt. Bring to a boil then reduce the heat until sauce simmers gently. Cover and cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, for the flavors to blend.

Add the clams and shrimp; stir. Add the fish and stir gently. Increase the heat to high. Cook for 2 minutes or until liquid starts to bubble. Add the water. Cover and reduce the heat so the mixture simmers but does not boil. Cook for 10 minutes or until the clams open and the other seafood is opaque in the center. Discard any clams that will not open. Spoon over bread set in pasta plates or large shallow bowls. Sprinkle with the remaining parsley.

What Italian seafood stews have you savored and where? Tell us!

Photograph of Elena Kostioukovitch by Massimo Pasquale

Elena Kostioukovitch is not Italian. She was born in Kiev, Ukraine. But Kostioukovitch is deeply in touch with her Inner Italian. How do I know? I’ve been reading Why Italians Love to Talk About Food, the Farrar, Straus and Giroux publication of her book.

Kostioukovitch’s day job is to translate the literary works of Umberto Eco and other authors into the Russian language. Also an essayist and literary agent, she has lived in Milan for more than two decades. She explains in the preface to her 400-plus page tome, “This book was born specifically to assemble in a single volume stories about the symbolic foods of each Italian region and their ‘ideological’ meanings.”

She creates an intellectual journey from the north of the peninsula to the south, exploring culinary history, characteristic dishes, and cultural eccentricities of each region. Her research is rigorous — footnotes and bibliography cover more than 30 pages.

We learn, for instance, that the aperitivo Campari was created by Gaspare Campari at the Caffè Zucca in Milan in 1867.

We practically taste the brine on our lips as we discover that the remaining wilderness of Puglia fosters in the locals a preference for unadulterated foods. “The tendency to eat unprocessed food is especially evident in the consumption of raw fish. In fish markets, for example, it is customary to set out plates of raw shrimp, cuttlefish, and mussels for customers who are waiting, to be eaten on the spot with a squirt of lemon.”

And who knew that Nutella, the jarred gianduia paste created by the Ferrero brothers in Piedmont, makes a political statement? Kostioukovitch explains, “Nutella, loved by children (naturally) and adults, was also prized by nonconformists and leftists. As Italy’s answer to [American peanut butter], it is winning, uplifting, and youthful, a sign of democracy and leftist ideals.”

Essays interspersed between the regional food chapters are quirky and informative, covering topics as diverse as the “Jews,” “Early Gifts from the Americas,” “Totalitarianism,” and “Joy.” I particularly appreciated “Preparation Methods,” a roster of dozens of cooking techniques written in sort of a shorthand code. Not much is spelled out for the Italian home cook in printed recipes—presumably the cook learned these methods at an older cook’s elbow.

“Soak prickly pears.”

“Extract the ink from cuttlefish.”

“Shape polenta in a cloth.”

“Crogiolare (bask or laze comfortably): cook a food over a slow fire, with a little liquid, for a long time.”

One word of warning: Perusing this volume can be hazardous on an empty stomach. Hunger ensues. References to Roman coda all vaccinara (oxtail stew), Neopolitan sartù, (a rice mold with giblets, mushrooms, peas and mozzarella), Ferrara’s pumpkin filled tortelli, Calabrian jujume (sea anemone fritters), Sicilian granita with brioche, and more dishes too numerous to recount will surely make you long to be dining at an Italian table.

Kostioukovitch bottom line is this: “Examining the culture of food, we also come to understand its unique ability to inspire joy and create harmony. Whether at table with family, in a restaurant with friends, or at a scientific conference—food is talked about in a language that is accessible to all, exciting to everyone, democratic and positive.”

What conversations have you enjoyed around an Italian table?

Comment below.

Octopus salad prepared with fennel, red bell peppers, extra virgin olive oil and coarsely ground black pepper.

Chill rain and high winds aren’t exactly a siren song call to the beach. When Walter and I visited Puglia this spring, the region was experiencing the wettest primavera for scores, perhaps hundreds of years. (The longevity of the record seemed to grow with each subsequent local we met).

While we didn’t get to wiggle our toes in warm sand, we did sample a taste of the sea at Il Vecchio Forno, a very good seafood restaurant in the shore town of Barletta on the Adriatic coast north of Bari.

A gratin of mussels blanketed in breadcrumbs and olive oil.

We savored many courses, all prepared simply from pristinely fresh seafood. Most memorable are a gratin of mussels, fish fritters, fried anchovies, octopus salad, seafood risotto, and a grilled spigola (sea bass) with lemon.

Il Vecchio Forno

Via Cialdini 61

Barletta, Puglia