Cioppino’s Back-Yard Necessities

Robert Ozibko’s friends say he has spoiled them, that once they have enjoyed his cioppino, they never again order the dish in restaurants because it is bound to arrive in a tureen of disappointment.

Not that he won’t share the recipe; he does that cheerfully. The problem is that so many of the key ingredients for the sauce come from his back-yard garden, and he doesn’t raise enough to go around.

“You need fresh tomatoes, and you can’t do without really fresh-picked basil,” said the Irvine resident and partner in the engineering firm of Civil Design Consultants of Irvine.

But there are some other personal touches of Ozibko’s that you won’t find in the standard recipe for this classic dish. For instance, “never, never cook the clams with the rest of the ingredients; you don’t know where they’ve been.”

And, “don’t use red wine; it destroys that bright, clean color of the sauce. Use white, or sherry, I don’t care what the recipe says.”

And his main advice for just about any dish he prepares: “Don’t read the recipe, except to check and make sure you haven’t left out some important ingredients.”

As to the clams, he cooks them separately in a pot of white wine, drains them and adds to the rest of the ingredients just before serving.

The 45-year-old Argentine-born Ozibko (“I’m all mixed up; my mother is Italian, my father is Ukrainian and I’m born in South America”), says he really didn’t get into cooking until he came to this country in 1964.

“I was living alone and got very tired of restaurant food and frozen stuff, so I started experimenting.”

What he says he discovered was that he not only enjoyed the kitchen, but it was like therapy for him. And, “it was great for socializing.”

To this day, “it is still my therapy; that and taking care of my garden” of tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, spinach, eggplant, parsley, zucchini and, of course, basil.

“My greatest reward is to have a friend compliment me on a dish after I’ve had this perfectly wonderful time preparing it.”

CIOPPINO

Ingredients

1/2 cup olive oil

2/3 cloves garlic, chopped

1 1/2 cups chopped onions

1/2 cup chopped parsley

2 tablespoons chopped celery

1 tablespoon chopped green bell pepper

3 pounds fresh tomatoes

1 8-ounce can tomato sauce

1 cup sherry or white wine

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

1/2 teaspoon paprika

1/2 teaspoon sweet basil leaves

1 1/2 pounds shelled, cleaned shrimp

1 1/2 pounds assorted fish fillets (orange roughy, red snapper, sea bass)

1 1/2 pounds cooked, cracked crab legs

2 dozen fresh clams

Preparation

In Dutch oven or large kettle, saute garlic, onions, parsley, celery and green pepper in hot olive oil. Place tomatoes in boiling water until skin easily can be removed. Cut into quarters and place in pot, along with tomato sauce, wine and seasonings. Simmer one hour.

While sauce is cooking, cut fish in pieces, scrub clams, clean crab. After sauce is cooked, add everything but clams and cook until fish is done (no more than 25 minutes). Simmer clams in separate pot of water or white wine until they open (about 10 minutes). Add to pot and serve with garlic or pizza bread.