OK, now: prepare a base for the mussels. I used a big deep pot where I added some olive oil, to finely chopped sticks of celery, to chopped leeks, 2 cloves of garlic and 2 glassesand let it all blend and golden up. When that was the case (about 10 minutes), I added 2 glasses of chardonnay (or any white wine you have around) and threw in the mussles. Close the lid and cook slowly for about 15 minutes or until you think they are cooked. The lid is important, as it allows for a proper "sterilisation" of the mussel shells, by entrapping the high temperature steam in the pot.
Next, let's prepare the squid. First of all, take the squid and chop it into small pieces (like 1x0.5 cm for example), including tentacles. Wash it all nicely under a lot of water. Now, in a wide and tallish pan, crush 2 cloves of garlic, add 2-3 tbsp of olive oil and warm it up. Cut a few thin slices of the bottarga, chop into as finely as you can and add it to the oil/garlic mix. Stir for 5 minutes and then add the squid and half a glass of white wine.
Cook at high temp for 5 minutes, turn down the heat and wait until the next step is ready. In the meantime, get some tomatoes and chop them finely.
Now, it gets "complicated" :) At this point, the water should be boiling, thus throw the pasta in. Take the mussels off their broth and toss them in the frying pan. Pass the broth through a sieve and put the liquid back in the pot. When the pasta is half cooked (let's say 5 minutes) take it off that water and finish cooking it in the mussels broth. Just before it's ready, drain it, put it back in the pan, add the fish together with the finely diced tomatoes.
Ready. Crack open another bottle of white (I love Chablis or Greco di Tufo with these dishes) and enjoy. I loved it!!! Foodgasmic!!!!
Here's the "precise" list of ingredients:
- Olive oil
- 4 cloves of garlic
- 500 grams of spaghetti
- 1.5 kg of fresh mussels
- 1kg of fresh squid
- 5 tomatoes
- 3 slices of tuna bottarga
- 2 sticks of celery
- 2 leeks
- half a bottle of white wine
- a lot of hunger
- a love for good food
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