If you are in to seafood, a good moules marinières is a real treat. With a little bit of effort, our moules marinières recipe will satisfy anyone with a love of shell fish.

Before cooking your Mussles

Unfortunately, you can’t just start cooking mussles. There is a little bit of preparation to be done first. We have found this great little video from Bart’s Fish Tales. It shows you how to clean, select and de-beard them before you get in to following this moules marinières recipe. Please don’t skip this step. It is very important , to make sure you don’t eat any bad ones.

Moules Marinières Recipe

This recipe comes from Rick Stein. We have tried a few different versions of a moules marinières recipe, and this is our favourite with relevance to how easy it is to make and how nice it is.

Prep Time: Less than 30 mins Cooking Time: 10 to 30 mins. Serves: 4 to 6

INGREDIENTS

1.75kg/4lb mussels
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
2 shallots, finely chopped
15g/½oz butter
a bouquet garni of parsley, thyme and bay leaves
100ml/3½fl oz dry white wine or cider
120ml/4fl oz double cream
handful of parsley leaves, coarsley chopped
crusty bread, to serve

METHOD

Soften the garlic and shallots in the butter with the bouquet garni, in a large pan big enough to take all the mussels – it should only be half full.
Add the mussels and wine or cider, turn up the heat, then cover and steam them open in their own juices for 3-4 minutes. Give the pan a good shake every now and then.
Remove the bouquet garni, add the cream and chopped parsley and remove from the heat.
Spoon into four large warmed bowls and serve with lots of crusty bread.