Since I still had some parsley cream left, I wanted to make a nice lunch dish with it. Mussels are almost always available in the Netherlands, so we have some traditional dishes. However I think there are so many more options to eat them. Since there are growing the sea, they are quite sustainable. Moreover I love the salty/umami taste. Regarding this dish, you can eat this dish as starter for a dinner party or as lunch with some salad. Enjoy!
Mussel Pie & Parsley Cream
Equipment
- Oven
- Cooking pan
- Blender
- Fine Sieve
Ingredients
- 600 gram Mussels (no shell & cooked ; or use 1kg mussels uncooked in shell)
- 1 Egg
- 50 gram Butter
- 40 gram Flour
- Vegetables or Leek Optional
- 1 roll Puff Pastry
- 2 Onions
- Bunch of Parsley
- 400 ml Seafood Stock or cooking liquid of the mussels
- 200 ml Cream
- Lemon
Instructions
- [If you're using uncooked mussels] Clean the mussels by leaving them in some water for 5 minutes. Throw away the broken mussels. Heat some olive oil in a cooking pan, and add the mussels. Add 200 ml of water or white wine and steam the mussels until most of them opened (after about 6 minutes). The mussels which didn't open, need to be thrown away. For the others, you can take out the mussel meat.
- [Puff Pastry] For the pies, we need to make some pie forms. You can choose which form you would like to use but keep a starter size in mind. On the picture, I made 3 layers of puff pastry. The first layer is the shape, so for example a square (4x4cm). The next layer and the last layer are exactly the same. However I removed the inner part, so there is place for the mussels later. To finish, mix the egg and use that as glue for your pies. Start with the full form, add some egg mixture, add the first layer, add egg, add last layer and add egg. Bake for 10 minutes in a 180 degrees celsius (or 354 fahrenheit) oven, until brown and cooked.
- Chop the onions and parsley. Melt some olive oil in a pan and bake the onion till brown and caramelized. Add the parsley & stock (or cooking liquid of mussels) and let it cook for 5 minutes. Then add the cream and juice of half a lemon. Blend the sauce till smooth and pour through a fine sieve.
- Melt some butter in a cooking pan, and add the flour as well. Stir and bake until the kitchen smells like fresh baked cookies. Then add your mussels and your parsley cream. Let it cook until it has your preferred thickness. Season with some black pepper and maybe chili flakes (if you like!).
- Serve the mussels in the puff pastry and grate over some lemon zest before serving.