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	Stuffed mussels (with snails)                      Artichoke with cider         and seaweed vinaigrette dressing                                  ***             Cotriade with gribiche sauce                                   ***                   Breton far with prunes
Cookware
	- Large pastry bowl - Large stewpot - Terracotta dish - Cooking pot	- Gratin dish - Mixing bowl -Skimmer

Ingredients for 6 serves (1 dozen per person):

-10 large green mussels from N.Z 72 +
-25cl dry white wine
-100g grey shallots
-1 head of garlic
-2 sprigs of thyme
-2 bay leaves
-1 medium carrot
-3-4 Peppercorns
-Table pepper
-2 bunches of curly parsley
-5cl Pastis or Cognac
-Sea salt
-1.2kg slightly salted butter
-1 lemon
-Rye bread-crumbs
-Cooking rock salt

Preparation

Preparation 20 min; cooking 20 min

1- 6 to 8 hours before cooking remove the butter from the fridge and leave it to sit at room temperature. Keep a large pastry or roasting hotplate refrigerated.

2- Wash the parsley with tap water and drain it. Remove the stalks from it and keep them for your court bouillon.
Mince the parsley thinly. Peel the garlic and the shallots, chop 1/3 of the latter and mince the remainder.
Put the minced shallots in a large pastry bowl; add half a lemon juice, the Pastis and the softened butter.
Add salt and pepper. Mix this preparation until you obtain a smooth consistency.
Taste and adjust the seasoning but be careful not to put too much salt because the salt of the mussels can vary a lot from one season to the other.
Preheat oven to 180C.

3- Scrub and beard the mussels, rinse them quickly with tap water. In a stewpot, put the parsley stalks, the peppercorns, the bay leaves, the thyme, ½ lemon juice, the remaining garlic and shallots, the white wine and a knob of butter.
Cook over fast heat and cover it. Bring to the boil, then put the mussels in and replace the lid. Stir the mussels from time to time.
When the mussels start to open, remove them from the stove and drain them on the plate you put in the fridge earlier on.

4- In a terracotta dish, put 1/2cm of cooking salt. Remove the upper shell of the mussels; cover them with the snail butter using a metal spatula, then sprinkle with breadcrumbs. Place the mussels into the terracotta dish and bake for 5 to 7 minutes.

5- Serve hot immediately.

Ingredients for 6 serves:

-6 medium/large artichokes
-½ lemon
-200g flour
-1 onion
-4 litres water
-4 cloves
-6 garlic cloves
-2 bay leaves
-2 sprigs thyme
-150cl cider with seaweed vinegar
-200cl grapes pip oil
-100cl sunflower oil
-Sea salt
-Table pepper
-4 shallots

Preparation

Preparation 15min; cooking 20 to 30min

1- In a cooking pot, stir 50cl of water with the flour, using a large whisk. Peel the onion. Peel and pound the garlic. Add the lemon and its juice, the onion stuffed with cloves, the garlic, the bay leaves, the thyme, the salt and the pepper. Whip vigorously.
Trim the stems of the artichokes and add them to the preparation. When you have finished, put the pot over a medium heat, just below the boiling point for 20 to 30 minutes.

2-Peel and thinly chop the shallots and put them in a bowl. Add vinegar, salt and pepper. Whip all the ingredients together using a whisk, while pouring a small dribble of oil - grapes pip oil first and sunflower oil next.
Taste and season. If it tastes too much of vinegar, dilute with water.

3- Drain the artichokes upside down.
Serve the artichokes warm in a service dish, and serve the vinaigrette dressing in a table sauceboat for dipping.

Ingredients for 6 serves:

1.5kg selection fish (conger or coastal if possible)
2 onions
1 carrot
3 bay leaves
3 sprigs thyme
4 heads of garlic
50g slightly salted butter
Table salt and pepper
Water

For the sauce:
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
3 tablespoons white wine vinegar
9 tablespoons sunflower oil
½ bunch of parsley
3 eggs
1 head of garlic
3 grey shallots

Preparation

Preparation 30mn; cooking 30mn

1- Clean out and wash the fish. Cut them into sections or slices, except for the small ones (which you can keep intact). Peel the vegetables, mince the onions, and slice the carrots and the potatoes.

2- Melt the onions over medium heat in a stewpot until they become transparent. Add the garlic, the carrots and the potatoes. Cover the ingredients with water, then add salt and pepper. Bring to the boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes.

3- Meanwhile, prepare your gribiche sauce. Put the eggs in a medium saucepan with water, salt and one tablespoon of vinegar. Cook for 12 minutes if you start with cold water. Otherwise, cook for 10 minutes if you start with boiling water then cool it down using water.
Peel and finely chisel the garlic and the shallots. Mix the mustard, the vinegar, the garlic, the shallots, salt and pepper in a bowl. Pour a small dribble of oil while whipping with a medium whisk so as to emulsify the mixture.
Peel and cut the eggs up. Add them in your vinaigrette dressing with the parsley. Then decant it all into a sauceboat.

4- First, place the fish with firm flesh into the stewpot and cook for 10 minutes. Then add the other fishes with tender flesh and cook for 5 to 6 minutes. End by adding the more delicate and small ones, cook over low heat for 4 minutes.

5- Remove carefully the fishes with a skimmer and place them in a hot service dish. Arrange the vegetables all around. Cover with 2 ladles of stock and pour a few tablespoons of gribiche sauce.
Serve separately the stock in a tureen, the fish in a dish and the sauce in a sauceboat.
Accompany with toasted rye bread from the day before.

If ever one of your guests laughs like a seagull, then tell your friends a funny joke and you will feel like you are in coastal Brittany.
HAAARIH-HAAARIH...

Ingredients for 6 serves:

200g prunes
50cl boiling tea
10cl rum
100g wheat flour
120g caster sugar
4 eggs
25cl milk
25cl fluid cream
10 to 15 g softened butter

Preparation

Prunes soaking: 1h; Preparation: 10 min; Cooking: 45 min

1- Stone the prunes and soak them into the boiling tea and the rum for 1 hour until they become swollen. Drain them.

2- Sieve the flour in a bowl and add the sugar. Mix the eggs one by one using a wooden spoon until you obtain a smooth pastry. Pour the milk and the remaining rum by stirring carefully.

3- Preheat oven to 190C. Butter a gratin dish and flour it. Pour the pastry and place the prunes on top of it.
Bake it for 45 minutes. Cover the far with an aluminium sheet at the end of the cooking process if the surface browns too fast.

4- Serve in the dish after leaving it to cool and ambient temperature.

The “far aux pruneaux” is a specialty from the Morbihan department and its famous places such as the town of Quiberon, the island of Belle-île, the Gulf of Morbihan. But fars are also made with grapes, dried apricots or pears depending on which part of Brittany you find yourself in (Pays de Leon, Tregorrois, Mont d’Arree, Montagnes Noires, Cornouaille, Pays Bigoudens, Bocage Breton).

Don’t forget to serve one or more cider bowls!