Seafood Spaghetti with Saffron and Chilli

Seafood Spaghetti with Saffron and Chilli

This is one of my favourite meals for Sunday when we're not having a roast dinner. I made it today and realised I've never shared the recipe. 

I used king prawns, mussels and squid today and it is a little faffy the way I prepare this with the squid being fried separately, but it well worth the preparation and extra pots and pans.

You could make these with prawns or mussels that aren't in the shell, however I urge you if possible to make with the shells still in-tact, it really does add to the flavour of the sauce.

People often marvel at the 'unusual' foods that my young daughters eat, including seafood, but it isn't unusual to them, as they have both had seafood from weaning and they absolutely love it, just like me.

I do use a cheat here, a pack of prepared Mussels in Garlic, which you can pick up from practically any supermarket; you can of course just use normal mussels, but the garlic sauce adds to the pasta sauce.

You could equally just throw the squid into the pan to cook with the rest of the seafood in the sauce direct if you prefer. I picked all of the seafood up from my local Morrison's and the kind fishmonger prepared the squid for me so I literally just had to cut, season and cook.

Here's how:

• 12 large king prawns
• Pack of mussels in garlic 
• 1 squid, body and tentacles
• 1 large white onion
• 1 large garlic clove
• 1 red chilli
• 4 tomatoes
• 400g passata
• 1 tsp saffron threads
• 1/2 tsp dried oregano
• 1 tbsp tomato puree
• Sea salt and black pepper
• Handful parsley to serve
• Drizzle of olive oil
• 300-400g spaghetti or other pasta
• 2 tbsp plain flour
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1 lemon

Fill and boil the kettle. 

Add the drizzle of olive oil to a heavy-bottomed pan and place on a low heat.

Finely dice the onion, mince the garlic and slice the chilli and add to the pan to saute.

Now roughly chop the tomatoes and add to the pan once everything else has softened down. Finely chop the parsley and set aside for garnish, and cute the lemon into wedges and set aside too.

Season at this point and add the oregano and saffron and allow to cook for a few minutes. 

Now add the passata and tomato puree and allow to cook for fifteen minutes.

In the meantime, prepare the squid. Clean if necessary, otherwise, finely slice into rings, and keep the tentacles. In a bowl add the plain flour and paprika and season generously with sea salt and black pepper, combine and then toss the squid rings and tentacles into the flour and ensure they are well-coated. Now set aside.

Once the sauce has been cooking away for fifteen minutes, place the pasta on to cook according to the packet instructions and when only eight minutes of cooking time is left, throw in the prawns and the mussels and immerse into the sauce, turning every couple of minutes to ensure they cook through. You can see when the prawns are cooked through as they will colour to pink. 

In a separate pan drizzle a little more olive or vegetable oil and place on a high heat and once hot, add the squid to the pan, allow to cook for thirty seconds, and then turn each squid over and cook for a further thirty seconds or until crisp, then remove from the heat and set aside. (Please don't be tempted to cook for longer, as it will result in chewy, rubbery squid, a common mistake.)

Before draining the pasta, add a serving spoon full of the pasta-cooking-water to the sauce to loosen up and help the sauce stick to the pasta. 

Drain and shake the spaghetti to remove excess water then add to the cooking pan with most of the parsley and stir really well, ensuring all of the spaghetti strands get a thorough coating and then quickly dish up for the family. 

Complete by scattering over a final sprinkling of chopped parsley and adding a few of the fried squid rings to each portion and placing a wedge of lemon with each. Enjoy!

Seafood Spaghetti with Saffron and Chilli

Some other seafood dishes you may enjoy:
Vicky's Special Seafood Stew
Crab and Asparagus Linguine with Parsley Grantitata
Prawn Summer Rolls
Prawn and Chorizo Carbonara
Honey Chilli and Coconut Prawns with Ho Fun
Gourmet Seafood Burger
Crab, Chilli and Asparagus Pappardelle
Spanish Prawns with Chorizo, Tomatoes and Peppers
Prawn Saganaki

Vicky's Special Seafood Stew

I have grown up with a love of food and drink that stems from my wonderful parents, Les and Vicky. Practically from birth, my two brothers and I were taken to different restaurants and were always encouraged to try absolutely everything. We were lucky enough to enjoy lots of holidays abroad in various parts of Europe and so all love experimenting with new dishes and styles of food.

We were never shy of seafood or shellfish, and with them both hailing from the East End of London, we often enjoyed ‘high tea’ on a Sunday afternoon – a feast of cockles, winkles, whelks, rollmops, prawns and an array of sandwiches, always, always cut into quarters or as my Mum calls them ‘dolly sandwiches.’

Both my Mum and Dad enjoy cooking and each have their signature dishes, which get brought out for special occasions, birthdays and the like, and on request when one of us has a craving. My Dad is known for his paella whereas my Mum’s seafood stew is her absolute signature – and it is legendary. 

The whole family enjoyed this dinner this afternoon for no other reason than it is a Sunday and we were all eating together. It occurred to me that in writing this blog since January 2010, I’ve never shared this wonderful recipe, which has been honed to perfection by my Mum over the years.

Originally found in a 1997 edition of ‘Best Ever Cook’s Collection, Farmhouse Cooking’ which incidentally has some fantastic recipes included, my Mum has experimented with lots of variations. For special occasions, this is made with lobster, but for a standard Sunday lunch, like today, we had langoustines in in place of the luxury crustacean. Monkfish works really well in this stew, being a little meatier than some white fish, it holds together better, but you really could use any fish. 

My mum’s addition to make this a little heartier is to serve over pasta. We’ve had linguine, spaghetti and vermicelli before but any would work, today we had pretty tripoline – the telephone wire looking ribbons.

So here is Vicky’s Special Seafood Stew:

·         12 Langoustines or a lobster if you’re feeling flush

·         24 fresh mussels

·         1 large monkfish tail or a cod fillet of about 300g

·         1 tbsp plain flour

·         225g squid

·         90ml olive oil

·         12 large raw prawns

·         450g tomatoes

·         2 large onions

·         4 garlic cloves

·         2 tbsp brandy

·         2 bay leaves

·         1 tbsp paprika

·         1 large red chilli

·         300ml fresh fish stock

·         3 tbsp ground almonds

·         2 tbsp parsley

·         Salt & Pepper

·         Pasta of your choice

Firstly scrub the mussels, and get rid of any that are open. Chop the monkfish into bite-size chunks..

Liberally season the flour and toss the monkfish and squid in it and then fry on a high heat in a drizzle of olive oil to sear for a minute or so and then set aside.

Fry the prawns and set aside with the squid and monkfish.

Peel the tomatoes (a tip is to put them into boiling water for 30 seconds-1 minute and then move into ice cold water to ease the skins off). Chop roughly. Chop the chilli (if you like a fiery kick leave the seeds in, but remove if you prefer a milder dish).

Dice the onions, crush the garlic and add to the pan (keeping back about 1 clove of crushed garlic). Allow to soften then add the brandy and set alight to flambé. When the flames have died down, add the tomatoes, chilli, bay leaves and paprika and pour over the fish stock. Gently bring to the boil, and then reduce and simmer for five minutes.

Add the mussels and langoustines to the sauce and cover, keeping on a medium heat for 3-4 minutes. Once the mussels have opened, remove them from the juice, and again get rid of any that haven’t opened.

Cook the pasta you’re using in a separate pot of water.

Make a flavourful paste to intensify the stew by blending the ground almonds, garlic and parsley with a good pinch of salt and pepper and stir into the sauce.

Finally return all of the fish and seafood to the stew pot and cook on a low heat for a further five minutes until hot through.

We always serve this at the table, but pile in the pasta first into a soup bowl and then ladle in the stew. Make sure you have some fresh, preferably crusty bread to dip in and soak up all of the fantastic flavours – you won’t be disappointed. I advise a glass of Rioja or a jug of sangria to go alongside. 

Bistro du Vin Clerkenwell

I was recently invited to dine at Clerkenwell's relatively new Bistro du Vin courtesy of the lovely people at The Cullinary Guide. This is one of the newest members of the popular Hotel du Vin family so I was keen to see how it matched up and what it had to offer.

I took the boy again and as it was just over a week since we'd been to Les Deux Salons, I was slightly worried he wouldn't be keen on more French fare. I need not have worried though he'll try anything and luckilly he had a very enjoyable meal.

Like Les Deux Salons this place had the buzzing atmosphere that I think is essential to any French bistro-style venue in London. What I thought gave Bistro du Vin the edge was the fact it's slightly more compact therefore created a very intimate setting. Overhearing the chatter from the neighbouring tables does, for me, put me in mind of a French restaurant. It was very busy with a mixed bag of diners and there was just a genuinely good vibe about the place. Also the decor is very chic and stylish, I was suitably impressed.

The menu has a good selection, but not an overbearingly long list and it didn't take me long to opt for a fishy feast. I chose the potted crab to start and it was sublime. Simple but perfect. A delicious round of white, dressed crab meat topped with an amost paste-like brown crab meat and served with delicious, crispy, lightly grilled sourdough slices which tasted as though they had been rubbed all over with garlic, salt and pepper - it was lovely. A little large for one person perhaps, but this turned out to be a blessing.

The boy chose the lamb sweetbreads - like the snails the week before, this offal dish is something he'd never tried before. They were fantastic, well seasoned, cooked to tender perfection, full of delicious flavour in a sticky berry jus and topped with a little coriander. Once again this was a large portion for an entree, however for the boy with his larger appetite, this was not a problem.

For his main the boy went for a sirloin of steak cooked medium rare and I have to say it was truly cooked beautifully. Flavoured with a subtle hint of garlic and with an almost crust of salt on the outside it was melt-in-the-mouth gorgeous. He had some chips on the side, which were good, and which I naturally stole a few of.

My main course was, unfortunately, a bit of a let-down to an otherwise excellent meal. I'd ordered the Sole Veronique, which promised to be sole cooked in a creamy white wine sauce with mushrooms, clams and mussels. The sole was cooked well and did have a lovely fresh flavour, taking in all of the contributing flavours from the sauce and the shellfish and the sprigs of parsley that were plentiful. So far, so good. I'd ordered some new potatoes and a mixed leaf salad which were also good, the salad was dressed in a nice, simple oil.

The disappointment came when I first tried a clam. I'd had probably the best clams I've ever tasted a couple of weeks earlier at Fino, but these would probably have still been as good, as the flavours seemed fine, however as I took a bite, my mouth was filled with gritty bits of sand. Not good. I would have been willing to put this down as a bad one that had slipped through the net, but I tried another and once again my teeth came down on sand, very, very unpleasant. The realisation that these hadn't been cleaned properly didn't fill me with joy.

I tried to persevere as the sole really was very good, and after a few enjoyable mouthfuls I plucked up the courage to try one of the mussels. These were the same as the clams and unfortunately it was the final nail in the coffin for this dish for me. I was beyond put-off. Clearly you don't ever want to take a chance with shellfish anyway and I was suprised that a restaurant of this standing could fail in such a basic way.

At least I had room for pudding (every cloud and all that). To be frank the dessert I chose was alone worth visiting the restaurant for. It was gorgeous - a valrhona chocolate tart with honeycomb and a vanilla chantilly cream. The pastry was the best I've ever tasted in England by a mile sweet, light and delicate with a filling to die for. The chocolate was creamy, rich and almost velvetty - it literally had me making 'mmm' sounds out loud about three times. The cream and delicious, crunchy honeycomb were the perfect partners for this chocolate perfection.

The boy had a strawberry and cream affair which was nice, but not a patch on mine.

Aside from the main course of mine, we enjoyed a great meal and I can see Bistro du Vin's Clerkenwell joint going from strength to strength. They were bursting at the seams and as I mentioned they really had a great atmosphere.

The presentation wasn't amazing. It was good and all looked appetising, but as they say on their website they're not trying to be pretentious, merely provide wholesome, hearty food and I think they have achieved this well - with a few adjustments in the kitchen (especially where cleaning out clams and mussels are concerned) I think this will become a front-runner on the London restaurant scene.

What I think makes this superior from other bistro-style restaurants I've visited in London is the centre-point open plan kitchen with bar-style seating. Diners are able to take their dinner at the bar and enjoy the theatre of watching their dinner being cooked - wonderful.

Service on the whole was good throughout - the head waiter in particular took his time to welcome us. Also the wine waiter was very attentive and good at explaining what would make a good pairing to various parts of the meal, which I found impressive. Towards the end of the meal we did find we had to fight for attention a little bit and certainly we waited a while for our empty dessert plates to be taken away. But to be fair to the staff it was very busy in the restaurant at this time - I'd put this down as a teething problem.

Bistro du Vin's Soho sister is due to open shortly and I for one will definitely be booking a table to see how this matches up - although I may give shellfish dishes a miss!

For more information or to book a table please visit the website at:

http://www.bistroduvinandbar.com/