Why Homemade Fish Stock is Worth the Effort

A Step-by-Step Guide to Making Delicious Fish Stock

Of all the stocks home cooks need to prepare for their favorite recipes, seafood stock is not at the top of the list. Finding chicken and beef stock in your local market has always been easy, but it is hard to find seafood or fish stock.

That's changing, and commercial seafood stock is on my supermarket shelves. But what if I want to make my homemade fish stock?

Is Seafood Stock the Same as Fish Stock?

Interesting question!

Fish stock is only made from the bones and body parts of fish, whereas seafood stock can be made with fish and shellfish.

When I make risotto that calls for it, I often use shrimp shells to make my simple stock by adding them to a pot of water and cooking the liquid down by half. This is more shrimp or shellfish stock, but it's better than nothing.

Why Use Fish Stock?

Another great question.  A well-made fish stock can greatly enhance the flavor of all seafood recipes like risotto and pasta recipes dishes, but it really reinforces the flavor of seafood sauces like Seafood Sauce for Pan Seared Fish Recipe.

A good fish stock also works wonders as a base for fish and seafood soups like New England or Manhattan Clam Chowder.

Ingredients

A good fish stock needs many fish bones, maybe even a fish head or two. I know you are thinking, "Where will I buy fish heads or even fish bones?"

If you only purchase boneless fish fillets like tuna, swordfish, halibut, or flounder, you will not have any bones or fish heads to make your stock. So what can you do?

1. Buy a whole fish like trout, flounder, or branzino and fillet it yourself. Save the head and bones to make tasty stock.

2. If you can't stand filleting your fish or cutting off the heads, make friends with your local fishmonger. Buy a whole fish and ask him or her to clean and fillet it, but save the bones and head for your stock. They will be happy to do this for you.

3. If you are close to your local fishmonger, ask them to save some bones or fish heads for you. They will most likely give them to you or sell them to you at a very low price.

Although you can use any fish available to make good homemade fish stock, I recommend avoiding oily fish like salmon or mackerel. These fish are very pungent and may give your stock an overpowering flavor.

Washing the bones under water is also essential to remove any residual blood. If using fish heads, remove the gills to reduce off-tasting flavors and aromas.

Other Ingredients

You'll be adding what professional chefs call aromatics to the stock to add additional layers of flavor. Aromatics may include onions, garlic, carrots, celery, and leeks, plus herbs like parsley, tarragon, cilantro, and bay leaves.

It's important to chop the vegetables into small dice or thin slices so more surface is exposed to the water, allowing for quicker flavor extraction.

When preparing a classic fish stock, the goal is to achieve a fresh, clean, delicate flavor that is not overly fishy in taste and aroma. From my research, a higher ratio of clean bones to water offers the best results.

Cooking Times

Making it at home is much faster than making a beef or chicken stock.  In fact, you don't want the fish stock to keep cooking down or it will become way too strong tasting and there's the risk of giving it an overly fishy smell.

How long you cook your fish stock depends on how much you are making, but it will typically take half the time it takes to make a chicken or beef stock.

📖 Recipe

Print Recipe

Fish Stock Recipe

Prep Time10 minutes mins

Cook Time30 minutes mins

Total Time40 minutes mins

Course: Sauces

Cuisine: American

Servings: 1 - 2 quarts

Ingredients

• 3 pounds fish bones fish heads or some combination of the two from non-oily, white fleshed fish like flounder, halibut, snapper, sea bass.
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 large yellow onion peeled and sliced thin
• 2 carrots thinly sliced
• 1 leek cleaned and sliced thin
• 3 stalks celery sliced thin
• 2 cloves garlic crushed
• ½ cup dry white wine
• 7 cups cold water
• 2 tablespoons black peppercorns
• 2 sprigs fresh thyme leaves and stems - roughly chopped
• 2 sprigs fresh parsley leaves and stems - roughly chopped
• 2 bay leaves dried
• salt & pepper to taste

Instructions

Clean the fish bones

• In a large bowl, place the bones (fish heads) and cover with cold water. Add a couple tablespoons of salt and stir to dissolve. Soak the bones for 30 minutes, drain and rinse under cold water to remove all signs of blood.
• Heat a large stock pot over medium heat, add oil and when the oil gets hot, add the onion, carrots, leek, celery and garlic. Saute until the vegetables soften, about 3 minutes.
• Add the white wine to deglaze the pan and let the wine cook down for a couple of minutes.
• Add the washed fish bones (fish heads) and enough water to cover the bones and heads. This should be somewhere between 7 cups of water.
• Add the black peppercorns, thyme, parsley and bay leaves and bring to a boil.

  As the water is coming to a boil, a white foam will appear at the top of the liquid. Use a large spoon or spatula to remove the foam and as soon as the liquid comes to a boil, reduce heat to a simmer.
• Simmer the stock for 20 to 30 minutes. When done, remove from heat and let the stock cool down for 10 minutes.
• Carefully strain the stock through a fine mesh strainer into another pot or large bowl. Taste and adjust seasoning with salt and pepper to taste.
• If you are not using immediately, let it cool down for another 10 or 15 minutes, transfer to storage containers, cover and chill in the refrigerator.

Notes

You can store the stock in the refrigerator for 4 days or store in a freezer for up to 3 months.

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