Spaghetti with seafood a la Carmen

Spaghetti with seafood a la Carmen

April 1st, 2018 | main dishes

Spaghetti frutti di mare, Espagueti con Mariscos, Spaghetti mit Meeresfrüchten, Spaghetti aux Fruits de Mer – fine sounding names for a wonderful dish. We liked it especially in the restaurant “Enriclai” in St. Cruz de La Palma, and we asked Doña Carmen for the recipe.

Spaghetti with seafood a la Carmen

“No cream”, obviously that was the most important thing, we learned in the “Enriclai”. “You take a bit of tomato, onion, a bit of garlic and a potato, a few spices. And of course super fresh seafood.” Sure.

My captain and I had a lot of fun working out the recipe one evening with a good glass of wine. And the result is impressive – sorry, tasty.

Spaghetti with seafood a la Carmen

(4 portions – Attention: you need quite a big pan)

1 onion (about 80 g) chopped

300 g of tomatoes, diced

1 ts coarse sea salt

1 potato (about 80 g), peeled, diced

2 TS olive oil

sauté all ingredients in olive oil until the potatoe is soft, add

15 - 20 basil leaves

puree, you should not add too many leaves at once, the sauce should stay nice and red, put aside

350g spaghetti

boil in salted water, drain, save 250 ml of the cooking water, keep spaghetti warm

1 kg of clams (or clams and mussels half and half)

wash, throw away broken or already opened clams

2 TS olive oil

stew the clams in the oil until they open, lift out, remove the mussel meat from half of the mussels, put aside

8 red shrimp with head and shell

de-vein (see tip below)

2 garlic cloves, chopped very roughly

fry shrimp and garlic for 1 minute each side in the same oil

4 octopus arms, cooked, cut into pieces

add

salt, freshly ground pepper

1/2 ts paprika

season

200 ml white wine

deglaze, add spaghetti, mix, stir in tomato sauce spoonwise until the desired consistency is reached, if necessary add some noodle cooking water

add clams

1 lemon, in slices

2-3 TS of flat leave parsley, chopped

1 ts olive oil

sprinkle olive oil on the spaghetti and serve garnished with lemon and parsley

Wine recommendation

On La Palma of course we had a wine from the island. Back in Germany, we enjoyed the Spaghetti Frutti di Mare with a Tertiär Chardonnay & Weißburgunder dry 2016 of the Palatinate winery Wageck – a great addition to this dish.

And this is how the wife of the captain does it:

Personally, I always de-vein shrimps. Although there are no health reasons for it, I think it’s definitely more aesthetic. In fact, in many European countries, the intestine is not removed. Depending on soil conditions and ingested food, the intestine is more or less visible. I use a small, sharp pair of scissors, which I use only for this purpose. I cut the shell of the shrimp along the back, then I can lift out the usually black intestine with a toothpick or knife.

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Asparagus with vanilla hollandaise, garnished with lemon balm

April 25th, 2019 | main dishes

Vanilla hollandaise with asparagus

At home, we love the first asparagus in the season quite classically with smoked ham, Sauce Hollandaise and the first new potatoes. But then we love to have varieties. Since my dearest captain always likes to bring home the very best vanilla from his travels, there is nothing better than refining a hollandaise with it.