Love those yummy French mussels

The French have a way of romanticizing simple things we take for granted. The lowly mussels, for instance. They may seem just another shellfish from the sea to be boiled and simply eaten. But for the French, there are a hundred and one ways of cooking mussels.

But hey, the French have had centuries of experimenting and creating culinary drama with mussels. Mussel culture has been practiced in France since the 13th century, although cookbooks say that mussel beds date back to the Roman times. The story is told about an Irish traveler, Patrick Walton, who was shipwrecked in La Rochelle region of France in 1290. One day he noticed that posts hung with nets used in the sea were covered with mussels. So he set up more posts, joining them with bundles of branches (bousches). This is the origin of bouchot, the modern French word for the wooden posts where mussels are bred.

The story is told to us by Louis Ysmael, Manila’s arbiter of good taste, as he describes the mouth-watering mussels prepared by chef Martin Bracker and his kitchen team at Nuvo in Greenbelt 2 in Makati. Inspired by French bouchot mussels, Bracker created exciting dishes for lunch and dinner at Nuvo for the months of February and March.

Priced from P180 and up per dish, Nuvo’s mussel festival covers finger foods, appetizers, soup and main courses.

For starters, there’s Bruschetta with Bouchot Mussels: Ciabatta bread topped with sautéed bacon, spinach, tomato and bouchot mussels topped with Edamer cheese, ovenbaked. Delicious!

Oven-baked Bouchot Mussels are also yummy, with the mussels filled with sautéed spinach and tomato concasse, oven-baked with garlic butter.

Grilled Skewer of Bouchot Mussels and Smoked Ham entices meat eaters. It is served on a wooden skewer with fresh tomato, zucchini and eggplant.

Roulade of Bouchet Mussels and Seafood is served with black olive tapenade salads in aged balsamic dressing.

Bouchot Mussels a la Mariniere is fresh steamed mussels in buttered natural broth with fennel and root vegetables.

Grilled Lapu Fillet in Zucchini Ribbon features olive-champagne foam and black olive tapenade, sautéed artichokes, snowpeas and tomato concasse with cubed pan fried potato.

If you’re craving for chicken, there’s Supreme of Chicken stuffed with Nuvo-cured Scandinavian salmon, served with white wine mussel foam, buttered garden fresh vegetable and garlic rice.

No sweet mussels for dessert, but as usual Louis Y’s blend of good music, comfy atmosphere and excellent service at Nuvo promises sweet memories, especially this Valentine’s Day.

Nuvo goes very romantic and very French.

Time to taste those mussels.