Mussels from Brussels
By Stan Szecowka
Posted On » October 30 – November 5, 2013 (Volume:12 / Issue 44)

Mr Mussels from Brussels has flown into Bahrain to serve up a culinary treat in a shell which truly tantalises the taste-buds.

Chef Paul Vanlancker is in charge of the kitchen at the legendary Léon restaurant in Europe, which can cook up a tonne of mussels for hungry diners on one Saturday session alone.

Freshly-sealed packs are being flown in especially for the promotion at the Mövenpick Hotel Bahrain with mussels still splashing about in seawater. Diners have the opportunity to meet Chef Paul every evening while he is preparing a three-course mussels dinner at the Flamingo poolside terrace – al fresco – until Friday.
 
“The best way to eat mussels is the natural way,” enthused Chef Paul on his first night in the kingdom. “The taste is second to none.”

He brought them to boil in water with celery, white onion and a pinch of plain butter for two-and-half-minutes before serving in special pots.

A half-dozen other recipes are available but you should always take the master at his word.

Chef Paul uses only the finest mussels farmed in the sea at Zeeland, the westernmost province of the Netherlands. They are sold and packed from a traditional fishing village called Yerseke where traders fix the price of their harvest each day.

Apparently, the Dutch have never acquired a taste for mussels and 80 per cent are sold off to neighbouring Belgium where they can’t get enough of them.

The Szecowka family used to travel regularly to Brittany in France for moules and frites, the French equivalent.
It meant a miserable five-hour drive down from Yorkshire to Portsmouth before boarding the ferry. Little did I realise the real deal was across on a North Sea Ferries ride to Zeebrugge, a port just an hour and 15-minutes away from the best mussel dish creations on the planet.

In 1867, Léon Vanlancker decided to set up business within a stone’s throw of Grand Place to run a five-table restaurant called A la Ville d’Anvers. In 1893, he moved a few metres from there to 18 rue des Bouchers and opened Friture Léon. The years passed and the restaurant expanded slowly but surely.

Real growth started as from 1958, date of the World Expo, when Brussels became the irrefutable capital of mussels and French fries. Since then, the Vanlancker business has not stopped expanding.

Nowadays, it extends to nine buildings and more than one thousand meals are served every day, always with a smile. Everyone comes to try out a menu that has hardly changed – one of 14 recipes for mussels or 120 traditional Belgian dishes.

However, over the last six years the King Léon team has not rested on its laurels. At the beginning of 1989, the dynamism of the Vanlancker heirs became apparent with the opening of a new Léon restaurant in Brussels, inside Brupark, in the shadow of the Atomium. Then in the same year, the business arrived in France with the opening of 51 restaurants in the space of 10 years. Additional Léon restaurants have been opened in Belgium.

And now Chef Paul is travelling around the world as a culinary ambassador and has held mussels promotions in Montreal, Boston, Munich, New York and Osaka. His visit to Bahrain came about following a chance meeting with the Mövenpick Hotel Bahrain general manager, Heinz Kraehenbuehl, in Beirut. According to Chef Paul, the Lebanese, in particular, love their mussels.

Bahrainis and the expat community living in Bahrain were set to make a similar impression on the chef if Friday’s opening success was anything to go by.

The three-course mussels dinner features a delightful mussel soup with garlic bread, mussels- in-the-pot with thick chips on the side and a delicious mayonnaise dip followed by waffles with fresh fruit and Mövenpick ice-cream.

Fabulous fare and a memorable dining experience at just BD 15.500++ per person. Book early to avoid disappointment as Friday is set to be packed as it appears that the whole of the expat Belgium community will be rolling by to bid farewell to their favourite celebrity chef.

Call 17460000 for more details.