Chinese Style Mussels

This recipe strays away from the traditional French style of steaming the mussels in white wine or a more English cider, both of which are delicious. This dish uses spice to warm you up during winter rather the more common comforting double cream in the sauce – not that there’s anything wrong with double cream!!

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  What you need for 2 mains/ 4 starters:

  • 800 g of fresh live mussels
  • 2 spring onions 
  • a thumb sized piece of fresh ginger
  • 2 cloves of garlic 
  • 2 tbsp of light soy source
  • 1 tbsp of chilli sauce
  • 2 tbsp of shaoxing rice wine
  • a bunch of coriander

  
  

  How to cook it:
  
  

  1. Start by prepping the mussels - by this I mean de-beard them (pull out the “hairs” from the side opening of the shell). Using a knife you have no real love for, scrape off any barnacles etc.  Now put all the mussels in a bowl with water and rub the mussels together cleaning them and repeat until the water in the bowl is clean. Once clean store the mussels out of water (fresh water apparently isn’t very good for the life span of the shell fish).  As a warning if when tapped the shell doesn’t close the fish is dead and you don’t know how long it’s been dead for therefore it could be rotten - obviously don’t eat it.
  2. The rest of the recipe is easy, peel the garlic and ginger and finely slice (I chopped the ginger into batons). Fine slicing creates a high surface area needed later in the recipe. Now slice up the spring onion but not too thinly (you cannot substitute for regular onion in this recipe). Pour the liquid ingredients, except for the oil, over the vegetables into a heat proof bowl.
  3. Steam the mussels. I did this by having a half full pan of water on the boil and placing a sieve in the pan (you don’t want the sieve touching the water) and put the shell fish in the sieve and seal in tight with tin foil (aluminium foil). Let the mussels steam for 5 minutes, they’re done when they have all opened up, discard those that haven’t.
  4. While steaming you want to heat up 4 tbsp of a flavourless oil (a groundnut or a sunflower oil) on a high heat. When the oil is just starting to smoke pour the oil over the sauces and vegetables quickly frying everything, extracting their flavour into the oil.  Remember to stir everything while it’s still warm from the oil, maximizing flavour extraction!
  5. Chop up the coriander, put the mussels into a serving bowl and pour over your sauce garnishing with the coriander. You can toss the mussels in the sauce ensuring good coverage and even dispersal of flavour!

  
  -while not strictly a Chinese accompaniment but rather a Yorkshire indulgence, serve it with bread to dip in your sauce-