Post Type ArchivesRecipes

Moules marinières

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Mussels in white wine with sweet potato fries

Almost every year since I met my companion, I’ve been going to the Braderie de Lille, which is dear to his heart. This is the largest flea market in Europe. It occurs yearly all over Lille, usually during the first week-end of September.

It is a flea market all right, but I’d say people don’t care much about buying stuff ; most of them just walk around, a beer in hand, laughing at highly inebriated people all around who sing and shout and dance, sometimes wearing disguises. Aside from inhabitants selling their old tables, kitchenware and whatnot, shopkeepers will often have an outside booth where they’ll showcase their produce, with massive discounts. There’s also food and drinks everywhere.

Besides beer (Northerners love their ale), there is one thing you’ll find on every street  : les moules-frites !! Each year, 500 tons of mussels and 30 tons of French fries are sold at the Braderie. Yes, tons ! Many different recipes are offered, from Moules Poulettes (mussels with a rich cream sauce) to mussels with chorizo.

But the classic one is Moules Marinières. This dish is so simple to make ! Yet, if you prepare your mussels correctly and buy them in season, they only need a few condiments to shine.

In France, for example, the Moules du Bouchot, the tastiest ones, should be consumed between July and February ; please find out the best season for your local mussels ! If you cannot, ask me and I’ll check for you.

I must say I am too lazy to make proper French fries to go with it though. If you want the dish on the table quickly, and with less calories, just make fries using your Air Fryer or your oven, like I do. It will make for a simple, tasty and healthy dish.

Moules marinières – Recipe

Picking and storing your mussels – Pieces of advice

  • It is important to buy your mussels in season, and to prepare them quickly after buying (within 48 hours at most ; 24 hours ideally).
  • Once home, remove the mussels from the plastic bag. Place in an unsealed bowl or container.
    Cover with a clean, damp cloth or paper towel. Remember: never store in water!
  • Store in the refrigerator’s vegetable crisper.

Mussels are fragile, because they are still alive when you buy them, and must remain so until cooked. You cannot freeze them, for example, else they’d die.

Prepping your mussels – Key points

  • When washing your mussels, be sure to not leave them in the water for too long, and always keep them moving. This way they won’t lose their flavour.
  • The best way to go is to fill a clean sink with water, drop the mussels, make circular motions for about 1 minute, then remove.
  • While checking each mussel for beards and barnacles (see instructions), it is very important thay you discard any opened or broken mussel.
  • When you have your mussels ready in your plate, do not eat any of those that did not open ; throw them away.

Now you’re all set !

Sweet potato & chorizo tacos

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Sweet potato and crumbled chorizo tacos with cilantro and pickled onions

Tacos de papa con chorizo is a classic Mexican dish.  You dice and fry some potatoes, fry your chorizo, mix it together and put it on a taco.

I felt I could fiddle with it, both in terms of texture and depth of flavour. I was so happy with the end result ! I replaced the potato with sweet potato, which brings a sweet, fruity flavour that pairs perflectly with the heat of the chorizo and the hot sauce. The sweet potato is mashed with butter, not sautéed : it forms a sweet little pillow on your taco, making it feel less dry.

Sweet potato & chorizo tacos – Recipe

Ingredients – Advice & key points

The trickiest part of the recipe is to get the ingredients. The rest is a breeze !

  • If you’re in France or in Spain, you can order from La Esquinita. They also have a physical shop in Paris I go to. This is where you can find authentic hot sauces (my favourite is this one, but only if you’re used to eating spicy food) and tacos de maïz.
  • If you’re in Île-de-France, you can find the tastiest Colombian chorizos from El man de los chorizos. I had a Colombian friend recommend it to me (thanks Tatiana, if you read me !) and I understand why. Mine is the spicy one.

For my other pals all over the world, just tell me where you live and I will look online if I can find some good options for you ! You can also make a quick google search for Mexican shops, I believe it will not be too hard to find in most countries.

Ingredients – A few specifics

  • Tacos : I recommend using corn tacos, which are more traditional are flavorful than their wheat counterpart.
  • Mexican chorizo : Don’t confuse Mexican chorizo with Spanish chorizo. A Mexican-type chorizo is seasoned raw meat (often within a sausage) and is usually cooked like ground meat, removed from its casing. My Colombian (haha, sorry it’s confusing) chorizo belongs to this kind. Spanish chorizo, on the other hand, is a dried cured sausage that you cannot crumble. Its texture is very different and would be inappropriate here.

If you cannot find it, there are some recipes online for it. There are also interesting vegetarian alternatives ; I hope to try one soon.

  • Pickled onions : If you don’t have some on hand, just use lime juice.

Now let’s cook it !

If you want more butternut recipes, you can also check my Butternut and guanciale pasta or my Autumn mini-pizzas. (ajouter liens)

Authentic Carbonara

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Authentic spaghetti alla carbonara with crispy guanciale and pecorino

This recipe is special to me.

I believe it represents what good cooking is. It’s simple, but it requires a bit of patience and research to master. It lets the ingredients shine. It is not pompous, it is cheap, but it is so much greater than the sum of its elements. There’s only 5 of them ; but the flavours, oh my !

Now I do not have any Italian roots, but I must have had in another life, because a true Italian mama lives rent-free inside of me, ready to snap at any rascal who uses cream or pancetta and calls it “carbonara”.

This is the real deal. Try it, and accept to maybe fail once or twice before succeeding ; you will be glad you did.

Authentic Carbonara Recipe

The authentic carbonara consists in pasta with guanciale – which is cured pork cheek, a highly fatty part- that you drench in a sauce made of eggs and pecorino (plus some parmigiano if you want to).

The challenge is to reach the perfect texture for your sauce. You must not cook it, otherwise it will just be a pasta omelette ; but it must not be raw eggs either.

If you follow my instructions, you should manage just fine !

Ingredients – Advice & key points

I usually go to Eataly to get the produce I need. If you don’t have one near your location, you can find fresh produce like guanciale and pecorino at your local Italian deli, maybe even your pasta. For pasta, if not available there, you should be able to order it online quite easily.

  • Pasta : While I believe tonnarelli is the best choice for this recipe, and was usually used in restaurants in Rome when I visited, spaghetti is also ideal.

What you must not compromise on is using Bronze Drawn pasta. Why so ? Because when processed this way, the pasta will present small irregularities that will enable the sauce to cling to it.

Do not use fresh pasta ; as they often contain eggs, it will make the whole dish too “eggy”.

  • Guanciale : You can buy it in blocks at your deli or have it pre-sliced. We want quite thin slices -not paper-thin, but almost- so that they crisp up in the pan, about 1,5cm x 4cm.

I’d really advise against replacing Guanciale with Pancetta, or worse, bacon or lard, as it simply yields a different flavour and fat content.

  • Cheese(s) : You can stick to Pecorino Romano only if you want to, which is the most traditional way, but I prefer a 50/50 blend or 70/30 blend with Parmigiano, which tones down the strong Pecorino flavour. It depends on your Pecorino type ; if it is quite aged, in the 24-36 months range, you might benefit from adding a bit of Parmigiano.
  • Eggs : You should use the freshest eggs you can find, because the sauce is cooked, but barely.
  • Pepper : It is important to use freshly ground black pepper. I personnally use this blend from Roellinger, but you can really use any, except highly fragrant, exotic ones.

If you don’t own a mortar and pestle, simply use the bottom of a small pot.

Recipe – What to pay attention to

  • Pasta :
    • Don’t oversalt ! While 10g of salt/liter is usually recommended, here, with the salt from the guanciale and the cheese, you can easily halve this amount.
    • We’ll cook the pasta half of the packet cooking time in water, then in the pan with the guanciale. It is important that you taste several times starting 2 minutes before the theoretical end time, so that you get perfect al dente pasta.
  • Guanciale :
    • You want to crisp it up, but still let the fat melt. Therefore, cook on medium heat. The process should last around 6 to 7 minutes.
  • Pecorino :
    • It is very important to thinly grate your Pecorino to that it melts properly. Look at my carbonara picture ; this is the thickest you can get. You can use a microplane, but if you have a kitchen robot with a really thin setting, it will also work just fine and save you the trouble.
    • Do not use pre-grated cheese ! Additives are added to these cheeses so that they don’t clump together, which will prevent it from integrating properly in your sauce.
  • Adding your sauce : Remove your pan from heat at least 20 seconds before adding your sauce, otherwise the eggs might overcook. Then incorporate your sauce progressively.
  • Plating : I highly recommend heating your plates in the oven for 10 minutes at 80°C before plating. This will prevent the sauce from getting cold too quickly and become unappealingly “set”.

Now you’re fully ready to cook a magnificent pasta dish. Off to your kitchen !

If you’re interested in more authentic italian recipes, you can also check my Ragu alla Bolognese recipe.