- Hi everyone.
I'm Jenny Dorsey.
I'm a Professional Chef, Writer
and a Contributor to Serious Eats.
And today I'll be showing you how to make Mussels escabeche.
(smooth jazz music)
I consulted with Chef Sergi on this recipe.
This is adapted from his original recipe.
So, before we get started,
I just want to show a video of our interview
and show how he has a wealth of knowledge
on all things escabeche, all things Catalonian food.
So, let's cut to that first.
(smooth jazz music)
(bell dings)
- Hi, I'm Sergi De Meià.
I'm a Catalan Chef based in Vilanova de Meià
It's a very small village on the Pre-Pyrenees
near the big mountains and near Barcelona on the middle.
- So, I first met Chef Sergi through his friend, Francisc.
And so he had introduced me to Chef Sergi
as an expert on escabeche and mussels escabeche.
So, I'm really excited that Chef Sergi's here today,
kind of in the flesh, to tell us about it.
- Okay.
Escabeche, it's a basic recipe in Spain
and also in Catalonia.
It comes from the middle age
and it changed a lot from the beginning,
but the essence is the same.
It's a product that you can put in vinegar
or in a lemon juice with olive oil and spices,
that's the base.
The first recipe appears in libera san subia
in the 13th century and it's made with mussels.
It combines the sea and it combines the spices.
Basically, it's a recipe to conserve the fish
or conserve the vegetables or conserve the meat.
- Yeah, on that, when we first started talking,
you were also saying how escabeche, at the early recipes,
were very different from the ones now.
And it had almond milk and you know,
just things that you just never see now, in this version.
So, can you talk a little bit
about how it's evolved through the years?
- When we start all these culture,
all these gastronomical culture,
we use a lot of spices,
we use a lot of vinegar because it's normal.
We don't have fridges
and everything turns to bad so quick.
So, it was a war recipe, you know?
We need to keep all these products well, to eat for a while.
The time passes and all these spices starts to disappear
because when you change the generation,
the generation think that the other thing it's,
it's just old things, you know?
And we don't like this, it's too old.
And also, the big social changes.
Now, we want to recuperate.
We want to recuperate all these flavors
and all these tastes.
So, it's a cycle, you know?
And when we can travel all around the world,
here is a small place that you can visit.
And you're going to be happy with this.
- Thank you so much.
What a nice note to end on.
As usual, it was so nice to see you.
Thank you so much for sharing all your knowledge.
- When you want to talk about food and gastronomy,
Sergi's here.
- All right.
So, first, you want to start a mussels escabeche recipe
with the best muscles you can get.
So, mussels are super versatile.
They're such a delicious animal, bi-valve,
and you can get them pretty much in any grocery store.
Just make sure that you get them fresh.
So, what you want to find is nice, closed mussels.
And if you find any that are slightly ajar,
you want to just make sure that they're still alive
by tapping them against really any surface
and you should see them close up.
So, it's important that your mussels
are still alive when you cook them.
I know it sounds a little gruesome
but you don't want to have dead mussels
because it can make you sick.
It's a good idea to just give them a little rinse
and then check through them one by one
by tapping on any surface and seeing if they close.
If you are buying mussels
and storing them in your refrigerator for a few days
make sure that they are not like sealed in the plastic bag
that you might have received them
behind the seafood counter
because that will suffocate them.
You also do not want to put them in water
because fresh water or tap water will kill the mussels.
They need to live in seawater.
So, what you just want to do is
put them in an open container like this
and leave them out in your refrigerator
so that they can breathe
and make sure that they're not too cold
or else they might freeze to death as well.
Now that we have inspected all of our mussels,
we're going to de-beard them.
This is really easy.
Essentially, you want some paper towels,
or you can use a hand towel as well.
And all the places you can see the little beard,
you're just going to grab them and pull them down.
So, some of them don't even really have beards
but any that do, you just want to grab and pull down.
So, now that we have our nice de-bearded mussels,
we are going to just put the mussels into our pot
and we're going to steam them in the pot without any water.
The mussels will naturally release their watery
sea watery goodness, so we don't have to worry about that.
They will not burn.
So, what you're looking for is the mussels to open up,
let out their mussel liquor
which you can save and use for other applications
like Paella
or honestly, like a seafood stock is great.
(hums cheerfully)
Ah, very lovely mussel facial.
(mussels rattle)
(mussels clatter)
Great!
While we're waiting for our mussels to cool down,
we're going to make our escabeche solution.
This is essentially a mix of flavored oil,
as well as some vinegar and spices.
So, for the base,
we are using a high quality, neutral flavored olive oil,
and we're going to add some aromatics to that mix.
Today, I have some rosemary, as well as some marjoram,
as well as a whole cloves of garlic that are unpeeled.
In the recipe, you'll see that it says thyme.
For some reason, I could not acquire any thyme.
There was no thyme in the five grocery stores I went to.
So, I went with marjoram.
But honestly, if you don't like rosemary,
you don't like thyme, you don't like marjoram,
you feel free to use different types of herbs that you like.
I'll also be putting in some Meyer lemon peel
which I grew in my yard.
You can use regular orange or lemon peel.
This is a pretty flexible recipe.
And then a little pro tip from Chef Sergi
is that he uses whole garlic cloves that are unpeeled
so that later on, when your mussels are curing,
the garlic is also cooking
and it cooks to a nice kind of like confit sort of texture
and you can pop them out of the skin and eat them.
To him, that is the best part.
I can validate and reassure you
that this is a very delicious part of the process
so you should not skip it.
So, with that, I'm going to add some oil here, some rosemary
and then our marjoram, got two bay leaves, my lemon peels,
as well as some cinnamon shavings.
I like cinnamon shavings
'cause it infuses a little bit faster
than like a whole cinnamon stick,
but you can definitely use cinnamon stick
Have some black peppercorn, some garlic,
a little bit of salt.
We're gonna heat this up again
on kind of like a medium-low heat.
And we're just looking to infuse all of these flavors
in our oil.
We don't need it to be like boiling.
We want it to like a light simmer
and to let that simmer a little bit
and then we're going to take it off the heat
and just let it do its thing.
Oh, I love how this smells.
Mostly, I like how garlic and oil smells.
Okay, so this is simmering gently.
I'm going to turn it off.
Let it just keep infusing as we shuck our mussels.
So, I'm going to carefully move my portable induction
to the side.
So, shucking mussels is super easy.
You can use your hands or I guess you could use a spoon?
But essentially, you're just pulling them out.
I think it's easier with your hands,
I guess so this video looks more sanitary,
I'll do it with a spoon for the first time ever.
And you'll note that some of the mussels
are slightly different colors.
I just got like a really orange one.
It really depends on what they eat.
So, do not be nervous if you get
a couple different colors of mussels as well.
Alright, I'm going to transfer our mussels into here.
So, now that this has been off the heat
it is now cooled slightly.
So, I'm going to add our sweet paprika and our wine vinegar
and then pour this whole thing on top of our mussels.
Now that you have your mussels escabeche ready,
you can cure them in the fridge for two to three days.
That has been like the optimal time for me.
But at two days, you can definitely pick one out,
taste them and see how you like it.
If you want it to be a little bit more strong,
you can leave them in there for a few more days.
I would say these keep for probably about a week
but if you keep them in the solution
of course they get more tart
and more pickled as time wears on.
So, just make sure to kind of keep on top of your mussels
and you don't like leave them back in your fridge
and forget about them.
They're so delicious,
so you'll have no trouble eating all of them
in one sitting anyway.
All right, well, thanks to TV magic,
we actually have some mussels that are ready for consumption
and I just fished them out of our olive oil
and vinegar mixture.
They look plump and delicious
and I'm very excited to eat a garlic clove.
So, you can definitely serve these
with any little appetizers you like.
I like to have some baguettes on the side,
maybe some olives.
All right, let's do a taste test.
So, one mussel by itself.
So good.
Oh, I'm tasting a lot of good rosemary which I love.
So simple.
And then of course on toast.
I'm like that greedy person
that I always make a really large toast for myself.
But now, I'm going to grab a garlic clove.
You can just pop it out of the shell in your mouth.
So good, so easy.
Thank you, Chef Sergi for that great tip.
Thank you so much for allowing us to adapt your recipe.
This is such a staple now in my household.
It just makes such a beautiful and effortless appetizer.
So, definitely let us know what you think.
Thanks so much,
and we'll see you next time!