Sicilian Mussels

With Jose Duarte

Fresh, delicious Prince Edward Island (PEI) mussels are readily available and although you may have your own special way of preparing them, you will want to check this recipe out.

The recipe is another example of how Chef Jose Duarte of Taranta (his restaurant in the North End of Boston) is becoming well known for his ability to take traditional Italian recipes and enhance their flavors even further. This version of preparing mussels is a slight variation of a Sicilian recipe and it features pancetta and balsamic shallots. Jose says that it is a good example of how Sicilian cooking is inspired by a long history that includes Arab influences and a tendency for sweet and sour tastes to combine in one dish. The results are an extraordinary flavorful way to prepare and eat this versatile shellfish.

Ingredients

1 strip pancetta
1 bag (about 3 pounds) Prince Edward Island Mussels, cleaned
Sea salt (to taste)
¼ cup Balsamic shallots
1 cup Marsala wine

Instructions

1. Make Balsamic shallots by roasting shallots in 1 cup of Balsamic vinegar in an oven at 325 degrees F. for 45 to 60 minutes.
2. Slice off a thick piece of pancetta and cut off the tough outer crust and most of the fat. Cut and dice the pancetta into small pieces.
3. Heat the pancetta in a sauté pan until hot and golden, rendering off the fat into the pan.
4. Add the mussels to the pan and a little of the sea salt.
5. Add the Marsala, cover pan, and let steam and cook under medium heat until they open, about 3 minutes.
6. Check mussels and mix together with the pan juices.

Serve immediately with fresh Italian bread, making sure that there is plenty of pan juices.

Recipe courtesy of Jose Duarte, taranta, 2011.

Chef Jose Duarte was born in Lima, spent much of his childhood in Venezuela, and now has a small but powerful restaurant in Boston’s North End called “Taranta,” where he’s created a wildly imaginative menu marrying Peruvian and Southern Italian cuisine. Duarte opened Taranta with his wife Anna in 2000.  With backgrounds in food and hospitality, Jose and Anna believed they would be cooking Southern Italian cuisine, but Jose began finding his native Peruvian foods in the grocery store, and he began to experiment.  Nothing is traditional for Jose anymore.  He knows Peru and he knows Italian cuisine (mostly from his time among the Italian community in Venezuela), but his food simply can’t be categorized.  He freewheels his way through both cultures, experimenting with methods and ingredients, inventing a menu that can only be described as “Taranta.”  

The food is too spectacular not to be recognized.  Zagat named it one of the best new restaurants of the Decade.  Boston Magazine named it one of the top 50 Restaurants in Boston.  The Massachusetts Restaurant Association has just named Jose Duarte “Chef of the Year.”  Duarte is on the cover of this month’s “Stuff” magazine looking like a 6’5”-ish, broad-shouldered Puck, kissing a very large fish.  With smooth skin, silver hair pulled into a ponytail, and just enough sideburn to whisper “style,” Duarte is a robustly handsome man, charged with Latin vivacity and passion.  

He’s not only winning awards for his cuisine.  Last year the restaurant received the MassRecycles Award for its powerful efforts to increase recycling and eliminate waste.  The City of Boston awarded Taranta its Green Business Award.  The restaurant takes serious measures to lower energy costs from low-flow water sprayers to solar candles on the tables, to composting, taking its waste away to Brick Ends Farm, the composting facility in S. Hamilton, MA.  Duarte has converted four Mercedes 300D’s and one Golf TDI to run on the restaurant’s cooking oil.  He’s replaced all surface cleaners with ionized water, which basically “lifts” dirt and stains out with negatively charged water.  What began as a business plan to save money has evolved into a Certified Green Restaurant.  Taranta produces zero waste. Duarte emphasizes that lower energy costs translate into more money available for the best ingredients.  Lowering energy costs equals a better restaurant in many ways. From Heather Atwood, Food For Thought, 2011.