Mussel Soup with Vegetables

Mussel Soup with Vegetables - a Different Way to Serve Seafood

Fresh mussels are not widely available in shops here. Therefore, whenever I go shopping and see them at the counter, I buy them straight away. As you may know from my earlier posts, I am still a rookie as far as mussel recipes are concerned. I have prepared them only in two ways so far: with white wine and pasta. That's why when I bought them last time, I wanted to make them differently. Cooking a Mussel Soup with Vegetables seemed to be an idea worth pursuing. And it certainly was as a result proved it – this soup was a hit: a delightful taste of mussels, loads of vegetables, some of them softer but other ones, like pepper and celery, wonderfully crunchy. Plus also all the warm colours of the ingredients. We all loved it, and I will make this Mussel Soup with Vegetables (many times) again!

Mussel Soup with Vegetables

Wonderful soup with mussels, vegetables and a bit of white wine.

Servings > < people

MetricUS Imperial

Prep Time 40 minutes

Cook Time 20 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 kg fresh mussels
• 150 ml dry white wine
• 400 ml water
• 2 tbsp butter
• 1 red onion small, thinly chopped,
• 1 leek* (weighing approx. 60g), thinly sliced,
• 1 carrot (weighing approx. 120g), thinly chopped,
• 2 tomatoes (weighing approx. 200g), peeled, deseeded and thinly chopped,
• 2 cloves garlic crushed,
• 1 handful parsley leaves thinly chopped,
• 1 handful basil leaves thinly chopped,
• 1 stick celery thinly sliced,
• 0.5 red pepper deseeded and thinly chopped,
• 100 ml single cream
• salt and pepper.

Instructions

Prepare the mussels:

1. Rinse the mussels very well in cold water.
2. Take a mussel: if it is damaged, discard it straight away and if it is open, give it a vigorous tap. If it stays open, discard.
3. If a mussel is closed (or closes after tapping), wash it and scrape off with a knife any barnacles; remove “beard” that may be between the two shells.
4. Repeat the above with all the mussels.
5. Rinse all of them again.

Prepare the soup:

1. Pour 75ml of wine and 150ml of water to a big pot, put the mussels there, bring everything to boil and cook covered for 4-5 minutes.
2. Transfer with a slotted spoon the cooked mussels to a bowl and leave till cool enough to handle.
3. Strain the cooking liquid through a sieve, layered with a cloth to eliminate any sand and impurities.
4. In the same pot (rinsed) melt the butter, add the chopped onion, leek, carrot, tomato, and garlic; fry for 2 minutes on medium-high heat.
5. Lower the heat down and fry the vegetables for 3 minutes longer, then add the reserved cooking liquid, the rest of wine (75ml) and of the water (250ml), the chopped parsley and basil and cook for approx. 10 minutes (till carrots are no longer hard).
6. Remove the mussels from their shells but leave a few for garnish.
7. Add the mussels, celery, red pepper, cream* and seasoning and serve the soup.

Recipe Notes

*In the original recipe double cream was used. I used single cream that worked very well but to make sure it doesn’t split when you add it to the soup, you should at first add a few spoons of the liquid to the cream, mix it well and only then add to the soup while stirring it.

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The above dish is based on a recipe from “The New Fish Cooking Encyclopedia” by Kate Whiteman