A recipe for caldo de pescado, a Mexican fish soup. This is a very simple, rustic soup that relies on fresh fish broth and vegetables based on recipes from northwest Mexico.

Caldo de pescado can be whatever you want it to be. Countless recipes exist across the Spanish-speaking world. This version draws on my travels in Baja and Sonora and is reflective of those states, with a little Sinaloa thrown in because, well Sinaloans really know their seafood.

I love this soup’s simplicity. You start with a whole fish, fillet it, then use the skin and scraps to make a rich broth. You pick out all the good meat from making the broth and use it, plus fillet meat if you want, to make this caldo.

All you need beyond that are a few vegetables, some roasted green chile, potatoes and shredded cabbage.

Like a lot of simple soups, caldo de pescado hinges on the quality of its ingredients. The fish should be fresh, the broth made that day, the vegetables charred to add flavor without added fat. I’ll walk you through it.

Fish for Caldo de Pescado

Traditionally this would be a white fish of some sort. Grouper, snapper, lingcod, rockfish, seabass, that sort of thing. Inland, you’d use bass, perch, walleye, catfish, crappie — anything that’s not to small, or too fatty. I’ve never seen or heard of this soup being made with trout or salmon.

You want to scale and gut the fish and remove the gills because you’ll be using the whole fish to make caldo de pescado. (Don’t worry if all you have are fillets. I’ll get to that in a bit.)

If they are small, like perch or little rockfish or brim, keep them whole. If they are large, you can make a whole pot of soup with just the head and the meat left on the carcass. Save the fillets for something like fish with mojo de ajo or chicharron de pescado.

How to Make This

You’re basically doing two things at once, so the caldo de pescado comes together quickly: You make a quick fish stock, and while that simmers, you char some vegetables to go into the soup.

You can follow my basic recipe for fish stock, or you can Mexicanize it using the recipe below. Regardless, it only simmers 30 minutes, then you strain it.

Meanwhile, you’ll be charring tomatoes, onion, garlic and chiles to peel them, and boost their flavor.

Pick out all the meat from the broth-making and reserve it, simmer potatoes, shredded cabbage and carrots in your broth, then when they are tender, you add the charred vegetables, fish and some lime juice to the pot and have at it.

Shortcut Caldo de Pescado

That was the good way to make caldo de pescado. Here’s the weeknight method:

• Dice boneless, skinless fillets of fish
• Heat up premade fish, seafood or chicken stock
• Simmer the carrots, cabbage and potatoes in that
• Char the chiles, onion, garlic and tomatoes while the other vegetables simmer
• Put them and fish into the pot, add lime and call it a day

Serving and Storage

Serve your caldo de pescado with corn tortillas as a nice light supper or lunch, or serve it as part of a larger Mexican meal. I have dozens and dozens of Mexican recipes to choose from here.

If you liked this recipe, please leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ rating and a comment below; I’d love to hear how everything went. If you’re on Instagram, share a picture and tag me at huntgathercook.