Thai Mussel Soup

Yesterday I wanted to make something a bit different for supper and I was lucky enough to get the tides right to be able to pick some fresh mussels. We have beautiful mussels here and they make a great dish.  Now my normal “go to” dish with mussels is to do them in a pheasant style. I’d steam them in white wine, garlic and shallots and serve with crusty brown bread and butter. Beautiful! But I was a bit bored of that so I asked my old mate Ross what he thought of a Thai style soup. He shot back a couple of suggestions and off I went! I had to make do with what was in the cupboard but I think it came out really great so I thought I’d share.

• First I cleaned and then steamed the mussels. I did this in white wine and garlic. Keep the stock! The mussels only take a few minutes to open and they done once they do, don’t over cook them.
• I had some Thai green curry paste so added that to a tin of coconut milk and brought that to a slow simmer.
• Add the stock from the mussels to the curry paste and coconut milk to make the base of the soup.
• Next, grated the skin of a fresh lime into that and then add half the limes juice
• Then add some finely chopped shallots or small onions (they generally sweeter) and half a chilli (add more if you want it spicier).
• Shell the mussels and add them.
• And to finish I added some steamed broccoli but you could use lemon grass or other greens to I would think. Just what I had 🙂
• Let that simmer for 10 minutes and serve.

If you want to bulk it up, add some noodles of sort. I like pad thai.