Mediterranean Seafood - Prospect Books

272 mediterranean seafood
Soupe de Roche (or Soupe de Poissons de Marseille)
Marseille fish soup serves six
This is a real soup, not a soup plus fish-course combined. I prefer it to the
more complicated dishes and give it very high marks indeed. It was our
favourite fish soup when we were living in Tunis.
All the good ladies of Marseille, not to mention their husbands, have their
own ideas about exactly how to prepare Soupe de Roche. But the general principles
are clear enough. The main one is that you use a large variety of small
rockfish, none of which survives to be served separately as happens with at
least some of the fish used in making bouillabaisse. And apart from standard
ingredients you will need leeks; and fennel and saffron. Provided that you have
these last ingredients, and access to a fish market where small rockfish are
deemed worth marketing, you can make this soup anywhere. (It is, by the way,
not true, as the Marseillais believe, that the right combination of rockfish is
found only in the Golfe du Lion.)
choice of fish Small specimens of any or all of the following: rascasses
(especially those on p. 146, which are not much good for anything else);
wrasses (pp. 110–12 – any will do, but try to include Coris julis, p. 111) and
conger eel (p. 55).
procedure Heat a few tablespoons of olive oil in a large fireproof soup pot.
Add to this the white part of 2 leeks and 1 onion, finely chopped or sliced;
allow to cook briefly; then add 2 large tomatoes (peeled and chopped) and stir
the mixture around. Next add 2 crushed cloves of garlic, a sprig or two of
fennel and of parsley and some thyme; a bay leaf and a piece of orange peel
(these last items are optional); salt and pepper and almost 2 litres (70 fl oz) of
water. The fish go in next, 1½ kg (3¼ lb) of them, gutted and washed as
necessary, the water is brought to the boil and kept boiling vigorously for 15
minutes. Now pass the whole boiling through a fine sieve (lined with muslin
to catch the tiny bones), rubbing it with a wooden spoon to extract every drop
of juice from the fish. (An alternative is to sieve it twice, first roughly then
finely.) Return the bouillon to the soup pot, bring it to the boil, add ½ kg (1 lb
2 oz) of pasta and a pinch of saffron and cook gently until the pasta is done.
Serve with rouille (p. 266), croûtons and grated cheese.
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