FOOD: Mussels with kombu butter.
I recently spent my weekend collecting and cooking shellfish in the pristine waters of southern Tasmania.
It’s a pastime I really enjoy. Collecting shellfish provides a strong connection with nature and requires observation and an understanding of the environment from which they are harvested.
In aquaculture, mussels are a pretty magical part of our food system. They have a restorative impact on their environment from filter feeding that can result in one mussel processing more than 100 litres of water in a 24-hour period. This filtering also means that no food inputs are required.
Mussels are effectively immobile in nature and therefore replicating their natural existence is relatively simple. Because of this, they have become integral to the development of integrated ocean farming systems.
But above all of this, mussels are both interactive and nourishing. We too often forget to celebrate and appreciate a singular object, instead always
• gourmandising by adding more.