Bean soup with pasta and mussels

Giorgio Locatelli’s cookbook, Made at home, contains delicious recipes that remind him of home. Try this pasta fagioli, for example: bean soup with pasta and mussels. The delicate, aromatic character of marjoram brings the flavors of the beans and mussels in this recipe together perfectly.

This soup is ideal served chilled in summer. For a little heat, you can add a splash of chili oil.

It is very important that the mussels are thoroughly cleaned. To clean them, scrub the shells under cold running water and remove any beards. Discard any shells that are still open or damaged, as well as those that do not close when you tap them on the counter. After cooking, any shells that are still closed must also be discarded. This helps prevent serious food poisoning.

Method

Place the dried (or freshly shelled) beans in a pan with cold water and bring to a boil. Cook the beans over low heat until just tender (allow 45–60 minutes for fresh beans and 1–1.5 hours for dried beans).

Scoop three-quarters of the beans into a blender with some of the cooking water (reserve the rest) and purée everything into a soup.

Heat the olive oil in another pan, add the leek, shallot, carrot and celery, followed by the garlic and rosemary. Sweat everything for 2 minutes, add the tomato purée and sweat for another minute. Remove the garlic and rosemary.

Add the reserved beans and cooking water to the pan with the puréed beans. Place the mussels in a large pan with the wine, cover the pan and place it over high heat; shake the pan a few times until the shells open. Remove the pan from the heat and set aside. Discard any shells that have not opened, remove 15–20 mussels from their shells and leave the rest in their shells for garnish.

Cook the pasta until al dente according to the instructions on the package. Drain and add it to the bean soup with the shelled mussels and some of the reserved cooking water. Ladle the soup into a large warmed soup tureen. Season with marjoram, salt and pepper.

Place the mussels in their shells on top of the soup and garnish with a little extra marjoram. Drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil and grind some black pepper over the top.

Title: Made at home
Author: Giorgio Locatelli
Publisher: Fontaine Uitgevers
Price: €29.99