About

A kitchen for the North Atlantic mussel

Moules Chaudes is a small culinary site devoted to the blue mussel of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Nova Scotia shore. The name is plain French: mussels, served hot, as soon as they have opened. That is the only way they should reach the table.

Prince Edward Island is one of the world’s important producers of cultured mussels. The animals are grown on ropes in cold, clean water, then harvested and shipped with the care that a perishable food demands. On the Nova Scotia side of the Northumberland Strait, and in bays along both coasts of the province, the same species has long been gathered and, more recently, farmed.

Acadian and other Maritime kitchens have always known what to do with a cheap, generous shellfish. They go into a pot with onion and salt pork, into a chowder with potato and milk, or onto the table with bread and nothing more than their own liquor. This site takes that inheritance seriously. The recipes carry the French names that belong to them; they are offered in French and in English, and they are meant to be cooked, not merely read.

The method is the same throughout: start with sound mussels, season the steam simply, take them off the heat the moment they are done — hot, just opened, and still juicy — and serve at once. A mussel left to wait is a mussel wasted.

This is a placeholder kitchen, and it will grow — more recipes, notes on cider and wine from the region, and a closer look at the farms themselves. For now, the three recipes on the home page are a complete beginning.