Mark Bittman

Steamed Mussels

Preparation info
  • Makes

    4

    servings
    • Difficulty

      Easy

    • Ready in

      30 min

Appears in
The Best Recipes in the World: More Than 1,000 International Dishes to Cook at Home
The Best Recipes in the World

By Mark Bittman

Published 2005

  • About

I’d had mussels in New York, even as a child, but never did they look so appealing as they did my first night in Rome, laced with onion, garlic, tomato, parsley, and lemon. Since then I’ve learned to love and prepare mussels in a variety of ways, but I always come back to these.

Serve with lots of bread for sopping up the broth.

Ingredients

  • 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 medium onion, chopped
  • 6 garlic cloves, peel

Method

  1. Put the oil in a saucepan large enough to hold all the mussels and turn the heat to medium. A minute later, add the onion and garlic and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onion begins to soften, 5 minutes. Add the tomato, if using, and raise the heat a bit; cook for 5 minutes more, until the tomato begins to break up.
  2. Add the mussels, turn the heat to high