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Corn-Seafood Stew With Avocado and Chiles
![Corn-Seafood Stew With Avocado and Chiles](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/08/15/dining/15apperex1/merlin_142068150_42e87ea0-4876-4fdb-bf40-41e8ac4edf95-articleLarge.jpg?width=1280&quality=75&auto=webp)
- Total Time
- 1 hour
- Rating
- Notes
- Read community notes
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Ingredients
- 4medium tomatillos, husked
- 2medium poblano chiles
- 1large jalapeño
- 5large ears corn, shucked
- ½tablespoon grapeseed or olive oil
- 4garlic cloves, sliced
- 2small shallots (or 1 large), halved lengthwise and sliced
- 2packed cups cilantro leaves and stems, plus more leaves for garnish
- ½cup packed parsley leaves and stems
- Fine sea salt, as needed
- 2cups vegetable, chicken or seafood stock, preferably homemade
- ¾pound squid, tentacles separated, bodies cut into 1-inch rings
- ¾pound shelled shrimp, cut into 1-inch pieces
- ½pound firm white fish fillets, cut into 1-inch pieces
- 2limes, cut into wedges
- Diced avocado, for garnish
- Sliced radishes, for garnish
- Shredded green cabbage, for garnish
- Tostadas, for garnish (optional)
Preparation
- Step 1
Heat a grill or broiler. If grilling, grill tomatillos, poblanos and jalapeño until well charred all over, 3 to 7 minutes per side. If broiling, spread them out on a large rimmed baking sheet. Broil until charred all over, 3 to 7 minutes per side. Transfer vegetables to a large bowl, cover with a plate or foil, and let cool.
- Step 2
Grill or broil corn until golden brown in spots, 3 to 4 minutes per side. Let cool, then use your heaviest knife to slice two of the cobs crosswise into 2-inch rounds. Cut kernels off remaining 3 ears and reserve.
- Step 3
In a medium skillet over high heat, add oil. When hot but not smoking, add garlic and shallots and cook, sautéing, until well browned, 2 to 3 minutes. Transfer to a blender.
- Step 4
Bring a kettle of water to a boil. Place cilantro and parsley in a colander in the sink. Pour boiling water over herbs to wilt them, then immediately run cold water over them to cool them down. Press hard on herbs and squeeze to remove excess water. Transfer herbs to blender with shallots.
- Step 5
When chiles are cool enough to handle, remove skins, seeds and stems, and discard. Add peeled chiles and tomatillos to blender along with a large pinch of salt. Purée the mixture, adding a tablespoon or 2 of water if needed to make everything move, until it is thick but pourable. Taste and add more salt, if needed. It should be well seasoned.
- Step 6
In a pot or large skillet, bring the stock to a simmer. Add fish and seafood and cook until it’s just cooked through, 1 to 3 minutes. Stir 1 cup of chile purée into the seafood mixture and season aggressively with freshly squeezed lime juice from some of the wedges, and salt to taste. Taste and add more chile purée if you like. Stir in corn kernels.
- Step 7
To serve, spoon stew into bowls and top with rounds of corn on the cob, more lime wedges, avocado, radishes, cabbage and cilantro leaves, with tostadas on the side if you like.
Private Notes
Cooking Notes
I made this last night. It was definitely a hit. As I live in a condo without access to a grill, I cut the kernels off the cob and charred them in a cast iron skillet. Indeed, the process does require more than the hour mentioned in the recipe. I can see preparing the vegetables the day before and combining with the fresh seafood and stock as a starter for a more substantial meal or dinner party.
I had grilled a whole red snapper, fresh and clear-eyed from Atlanta Highway Seafood Market, the night before and half of it was left over. I added 3/4 lb. of Georgia shrimp from Darien. The shrimp, smoked snapper, cilantro, parsley, tomatillo, poblano, jalapeño, lime, avocado and fresh Peaches and Cream sweet corn roasted to caramel perfection blended into a fine stew that I would be happy to find in a restaurant. Probably took three hours, but so worth it. I plan to double it for friends.
This was a fun recipe. I used two pounds of the seafood medley from Whole Foods as the seafood element (no fillet), and it was a "corn"ucopia of the sea. Really delicious. Served it with homemade tortilla chips, and used the leftover chile puree as a salsa verde for the leftover chips. I also used a pepper sauce (just the vinegar sauce from a jar of hot peppers) to crank up the heat a bit. I'll cook it again.
Used halibut and large tiger shrimp. Delicious and lovely to look at. Next time, I might not thoroughly seed the jalapeño to increase the spice. I ended up adding zhoug as a condiment while serving. This would be a good dish for a small dinner party since the prep can be done ahead and the actual cooking time is just minutes. Thank you, Melissa for another delicious recipe.
If you want to turn up the heat a bit, don't bother with the seeds, they have little to do with a chile's heat. Instead keep the white ribs or veins inside the chile as well as the little white pod the seeds are attached to under the stem--that's where the heat of a chile lives. Thanks for the tip about this being a good small dinner party meal that can be prepped ahead of time. It also makes clean up after the party much easier.
For the fresh seafood stock, what we seek is near at hand. Buy unshelled shrimp. Shelling and deveining them is a cinch, and the reserved shells need only go into water, with aromatics of your choice (onion, celery, bay leaf, peppercorn) for a quick simmer of ten minutes or so (once a boil is reached). Strain, and voila: a lovely stock. If you’re using lobster, the same principle applies, for claw or tail. Couldn’t be simpler, for a marvelous reward.
My nephew Bram prepared this stew for our dinner last night. He used Haddock and Scallops. This stew was simply delicious. He grilled the corn which added a great flavor. Avocado is super. I will try this myself. I agree with whoever said it took more tang an hour. Worth the work. Thanks to my nephew and the recipe creator!
This was so enjoyable. The herb mixture was a revelation to me. I’ve ordered pozole many times at a local restaurant but never knew the composition of the green sauce that gave it so much flavor. Thanks again Melissa Clark!
Delicious! Nixed the squid and shrimp (preference) and, for ease, used one bunch each of cilantro and parsley. Also 2 pasilla chili (inc. seeds) rather than the poblano (just because that's what was in the store). I am so glad the recipe creates left-over sauce. Huevos rancheros for breakfast and mushroom enchiladas verdes for dinner... Any other suggestions for the remaining sauce? What about drizzled over cantaloupe? Is that weird? Perhaps with a few toasted pepitas on top?
grab a rotissere chicken and shred it up, roll it up with some cheese and diced onion in corn tortillas (microwave the tortillas in a damp paper towel so they don't crack) and put 'em in a baking dish. pour the puree over, shred on some more cheese, bake it for 20-30 minutes. or, mix the puree with shredded chicken and have it tostada style - over fried corn tortillas and topped with avocado and tomato, cilantro, etc.
Delicious. Did not do the corn rounds, put almost all the corn in the stew, with some leftover for something else. Used a good vegetable broth and since it is salmon season here in Northern California, used local salmon (it was a treat due to cost). Another great Melissa recipe, thank you.
I made this, using my broiler, on a hot Sunday evening in Phoenix and it was extremely tasty. I used cod and frozen shrimp from the supermarket. My only question is, why does the recipe ask you to make more of the chile purée then you need? After adding the right amount and tasting I still had about a third of it left, which I ended up throwing away because I couldn’t realistically imagine using it for anything during the next week.
This took almost two hours from start to finish. The chile puree was great, but I think I'll sub in a bag of frozen roasted corn from Trader Joe's next time to speed up the process..
Salsa and chips!
You can ded use the left over puree in a homemaker salsa.
For all of the flavor of the ingredients, the dish did not work. Bland and boring result from a great deal of work.
Took a bit of prep time but nothing hard. I did shrimp, haddock and clam (steamed those separately then added at end for visual effect) It was delicious.The puree could be used like dip.I also make my own tortilla strips in the oven ..easy and a great topping.Hight rec doing the grilling on a separate day .
Just finished grilling and making the amazing puree. A little too spicy for the kids coming..What a fun soup. Going to add shrimp haddock, and clams !.Thanks for the heads up making the puree a day in advance ....post later how it is in the end ...
This recipe was great. We made it in an instant pot and cut time the prep time by using tomatillo salsa and roasted green chile to add some heat. We only used frozen cod (shellfish allergies). In the instant pot just sauted the garlic and shallots, added green chile, some salt and pepper, stock and frozen fish filets. Pressure cooked it for 5 mins, natural release for 5 mins, then added the corn (broiled separately), lime juice and recommended toppings. It was quick and delicious!
This is a keeper. Made a few adjustments. I used four ears of corn and did not use the corn rounds in the soup. I added a few new potatoes, diced and about 3/4 cup hominy. Used corn cobs and BTB lobster stock, doubled the broth. Halved the limes and charred them on the grill, this adds a hint of sweetness. A bit labor intensive but well worth the effort
Used a bag of frozen mixed seafood and tiger shrimp. WARNING… this soup takes much longer to make than one hour…especially prepping all the garnishes—but SO WORTH IT! I’ve made it 3 times now! The chile slurry is amazing. I Prepped everything except the avocado garnish the night before and just assembled when it was time to eat. — a lot of ingredients and a lot of clean-up but again, SO WORTH IT. I got raves and raves!! MAKE THIS STEW!!
We loved this! I am embarrassed to say that my husband and I ate the entire pot at one meal. It was labor intensive but completely worth it, and as others have said, the grilling could be done ahead of time to speed up the prep at mealtime. All I had on hand was veggie broth, but I added the shrimp shells and corn cobs and let it simmer for 15 minutes to add flavor, then strained back into the pot. We used an extra jalapeno because we like it spicy. We will make this a lot!
yes I doubled and had just enough for 7
This dish is wildly delicious, it's fabulous even...CAN NOT SAY ENOUGH PRAISE! Change nothing...It is Melissa Clark at her most awesome. I actually didn't think it was her recipe. Something about the ingredients and her style of writing didn't feel like her. My husband asked "is this Melissa Clark's"?Because we love her writing and sense food sense. I said "no"...but then I looked at the recipe again....It was MC
My family and I liked this, it is bright, fresh and a nice change. I used a frozen seafood blend from Whole Foods to simplify the fish/seafood part. Just microwaved the corn and cut it off the cob to simplify that part as well. Otherwise I followed the recipe as written. Will make again!
This is just delicious. I made it with an assortment of sweet and hot peppers from our Farmer’s Market and large shrimp and cod. The salsa from the tomatillos and peppers was outrageously flavorful and the roasted corn added a perfect flavor. Highly recommend.
This being January, there was no such thing as an ear of corn. I used frozen corn kernels, tossing them in a bit of olive oil and broiling them to golden after the tomatillas and peppers were done. Theses were sprinkled on top at the table, adding a nice crunch.
Delicious but so less fatiguing with these shortcuts: use Frontera salsa verde(don’t make your own); Trader Joe toasted corn and frozen mixed seafood; offer lime quarters. No one will know!
Made this last night; it is a tasty dish that took two of us exactly 1 hour to make (maybe we`re slow). We like cilantro but next time I will reduce the amount to let the other flavors come through; it was a bit overpowering. Essentially a one-pot (plus colander) meal. This is a keeper.
For those of us who would skip this recipe because it calls for cilantro, I have an alternative. If the dish is to be cooked, as this one is, I use Mexican oregano in place of the "soapweed". If it is to be used raw, as in a salad or salsa I use flat-leaf parsley. It's not an ideal replacement, but it is a pleasant flavor and only real cilantro fans will notice. By the way, it's not your fault you don't like the stuff: https://gizmodo.com/genetic-proof-that-you-really-do-hate-cilantro-594255
This turned out so delicious! Such a versatile and forgiving recipe. I didn't measure anything, subbed according to preference (shrimp & tilapia) and hatch chilies because market was out of poblanos. Topped w/ everything suggested and homemade baked tortilla chips. ~ 90 minutes. Will definitely be making this again!
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