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Seafood Bisque

Restaurant-Quality Seafood Bisque – Easy & Creamy

This creamy seafood bisque is rich, smooth, and packed with delicious seafood flavor. With simple step-by-step instructions, you can make a restaurant-quality bisque at home—even if it’s your first time making one.

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Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 35 minutes
Total Time 50 minutes
Servings: 4
Course: Main Course, Soup
Cuisine: American, French
Calories: 380
Ingredients Notes

Ingredients
  

  • Shells and heads from 1 lb of shrimp freeze shells from previous meals if you cook shrimp often — it adds up fast
  • 1 lb mixed seafood meat: shrimp crab, and/or lobster, cut into bite-sized pieces
  • 2 tbsp butter plus 2 tbsp more for finishing
  • 1 small onion diced
  • 1 carrot diced
  • 1 celery stalk diced
  • 3 garlic cloves minced
  • 2 tbsp tomato paste
  • 1/4 cup brandy or dry sherry optional, but it adds real depth
  • 1/2 cup dry white wine
  • 4 cups seafood or fish stock or water in a pinch
  • 1/4 cup uncooked white rice this is our thickener — a classic French trick
  • 1 cup heavy cream
  • 1 bay leaf a sprig of thyme, salt, and white pepper

Notes

Notice there’s no flour in this list. That surprises a lot of home cooks. Rice, simmered right into the stock and blended smooth, gives bisque its body without the pasty texture flour can leave behind. It’s an old technique, and honestly, it’s the one that took my bisque from “good” to “restaurant-good.”