...check out these guns...

Two weeks ago, me and a fellow friend of mine, Amanda went to eat at the fabulous Little Savannah in Forest Park as kind of a "splurge/treat ourselves well" kinda night. We started off with the Lobster Caprese, and then while I had the braised pork cheeks with polenta she had this wonderful bowl of different types of seafood in this amazing broth that we did not know how to pronounce, ha. Our meal was amazing and it was a wonderful night of conversation, drinks (including 3 homemade cellos that about kicked our butt) and fabulous food. While we were trying each others entrees, she opted to get me to try a mussel because I had never had one before. I knew I would probably like it because I like oysters, but I actually liked them even more. Maybe it was the combination of everything in the bowl along with the amazing broth, but I seriously went to bed that night and woke up at 5am thinking about making my own big bowl of broth and mussels!

While I was awake, I searched in bed on my blackberry for recipes for this wonderful concoction called Cioppino. I found two recipes on Whole Food's website that I liked, so that was my mission for the day.

With it being summertime, I love eating seafood, even when I'm not at the beach, so if you're in the mood for something different, here is my recipe for Mediterranean Cioppino with Bacon, if you want to see both recipes you can find it here and here.

Mediterranean Cioppino with Bacon

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

3 slices smokehouse bacon, diced

1 1/2 pounds mussels, scrubbed and debearded

1/2 lb medium peeled and deveined shrimp

1 shallot, finely chopped

4 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 (28-ounce) can crushed tomatoes

1 cup chicken broth

1 cup white wine

2 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 tablespoon butter

1/3 cup chopped Kalamata olives

6 leaves basil, chopped

Juice and zest of 1 lemon

For the mussels, soak mussels in a bowl of cool water for 20 minutes to help remove any sand. Drain, rinse well, then drain again.

Heat a large soup pot over medium heat. Add oil, shallots, garlic and bacon and cook 2 to 3 minutes, or until garlic is soft and bacon is cooked but not crispy. Add tomatoes, broth, wine, vinegar, sugar and salt and bring to a simmer; cook for 10 minutes. Add butter, allow to melt, then add mussels, and shrimp cover and simmer for 8 minutes, or until mussels open and shrimp is pink; discard any unopened mussels. Stir in olives, basil and zest.

Scoop mussels and their broth into bowls and serve with warm bread on the side.

*this is also great topped over linquine pasta!

For the first time making this, it turned out about as amazing as I would have dreamed of it at five am!