Specific Soups and Stews: Bouillabaisse

Bouillabaisse is somewhere between a soup and a stew. In America, New Orleans was famous for its bouillabaisse, the classic Provençal fish stew, which was a specialty of Marseilles, France. The French word bouillabaisse derives from the Provençal bouiabaisso, which means to “boil and settle.” This meant that the cook should boil the stew only for a short period. Bouillabaisse was a fisherman’s soup based on fish from the Mediterranean, particularly the rascasse, or scorpion fish (Scorpaena scorfa), but also the sea bass, bonito, conger eel, and other fish and seafood. During the nineteenth century, bouillabaisse became the rage in Europe. Recipes for bouillabaisse appeared in several British cookbooks in the 1850s. The American cookbook writer Pierre Blot admitted that the real bouillabaisse was made in Marseilles. Imitations, claimed Blot, were “very inferior to the real one.” However, he offered a recipe based on fish that could be procured in the United States.