10 Best Recipes for the Feast of the Seven Fishes

Our Best Feast of the Seven Fishes recipes including Christmas Eve calamari and steamed mussels with chorizo and tomatoes.

If you take part in the December 24th, Italian-American celebration, the Feast of the Seven Fishes, then you might already have a few favorite dishes lined up. Read on to check out some of our picks for that glorious seafood-filled night. Because you can always use one more option, right?

A tangle of fettuccine with scallops finished with lemon zest and chervil on a brown plate.

Michael Harlan Turkell

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Fettuccine with Scallops

This easy fettuccine with scallops and lemon gets even more extravagant thanks to a cream sauce. Perfect for a no-fail celebration of any sort.

Recipe

A red bowl with Christmas Eve calamari--calamari, onion, garlic, red pepper flakes in a tomato sauce.

William Meppem

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Christmas Eve Calamari

For this Christmas Eve dish, calamari is simmered in a sauce of stewed tomatoes, vinegar, onions, garlic, pepper flakes, and sprinkled with parsley. A simpler version of Feast of the Seven Fishes.

Recipe

A white bowl filled with Provençale fish soup with a spoon resting inside.

America’s Test Kitchen

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Provençale Fish Soup

This Provençale fish soup is made with a fragrant vegetable-infused clam juice broth and tender poached fish. It's easy and healthy, though you'd never guess from the abundance of flavor.

Recipe

2 white plates with mussels in sauce, with tomatoes, chorizo, and parsley. A piece of buttery toasted bread to the side.

David Malosh

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Steamed Mussels with Chorizo and Tomatoes

Steamed mussels with chorizo and tomatoes is not only simple, it's open to some interpretation. Find some mussels, maybe some chorizo, white wine, and a few flavorful additions. Add chile flakes, different spices, a dab of tomato paste. You do you–that's the whole point here.

Recipe

A white plate of bacalhau consoada or Portuguese Christmas Eve cod, with salt cod, small potatoes, and blanched kale.

ReceitasNaBimby

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Christmas Eve Cod ~ Bacalhau da Consoada

This Portuguese Christmas Eve cod, called bacalhau de consoada, calls for salt cod, potatoes, cabbage and hard-boiled eggs. it’s a simple, humble, traditional dish.

Recipe

A bowl of clams with chouriço, garlic, and cilantro with a savory broth on top of blue and white tiles.

Andrew Montgomery

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Clams with Portuguese sausage, Garlic, and Cilantro

Clams with Portuguese sausage, garlic, and cilantro is a beloved and ubiquitous dish throughout all of Portugal. Simple to prepare, the dish is made of sausage that's sizzled in a skillet along with garlic and clams.

Recipe

Coconut shrimp on a big sheet of paper towel with a glass bowl of mango habanero salsa.

Angie Mosier

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Coconut Shrimp

For this superb entrée, buy the biggest shrimp you can get. Take care not to overcook them, so they remain plump and juicy inside the crunchy coconut coating. They’re perfect with a fruity, fierce mango-habanero salsa.

Recipe

An entire fish baked in a salt crust on a baking sheet lined with parchment.

Jonathan Kennedy

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Salt Baked Fish

This salt baked fish recipe works with all sorts of fish so you'll be able to use it with whatever tickles your fancy. The resulting fish is perfectly tender and flavorsome, too.

Recipe

Copper pot with seafood soup with fish fillets, clams, mussels, olives, tomato broth

Christopher Hirsheimer

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Seafood Soup Amalfi-Style

When you're making a fish soup, the broth is everything. There's always good fish soup on the Amalfi Coast, where each town has a slightly different version. This is my own Hell's Kitchen version, intensely flavorful and complex—this is not zuppa for the faint of heart.

Recipe

A close up of an oval plate with 3 pastéis de bacalhau, or Portuguese salt cod fritters, and a lemon wedge, one is being cut into with a knife and fork.

David Leite

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Pastéis de Bacalhau ~ Salt Cod Fritters

These Portuguese salt cod fritters, called pastéis de bacalhau, are made with salt cod, potato, onion, and parsley and are fried for a traditional Portuguese treat.

Recipe