Here is a simple and tasty recipe for preparing the tubettina beans and mussels, a typical southern Italian dish uniting sea and land:
⭐ Tubettini with beans and mussels
🧂 Ingredients (for 4 persons)
320 g of tubettini
1 kg of fresh mussels
250 g of already cooked cannellini beans (or borlotti beans, if you prefer)
1 clove of garlic
1 chilli pepper (optional)
8-10 cherry tomatoes (or 3 tablespoons of passata)
Extra virgin olive oil
Chopped parsley
Salt and pepper to taste.
🍳 Procedure
1. Cleaning and opening mussels
Wash and clean the mussels well.
Put a pan on the stove without water, add the mussels and cover with a lid.
When they have opened, turn off the fire.
Strain the mussel water and keep it aside: it is essential to give the dish flavour.
Shell almost all the mussels, leaving some whole for decoration.
2. Preparing the base
In a saucepan, sauté garlic with oil and (if you like) chilli pepper.
Add the halved cherry tomatoes and let them wilt.
Add the already cooked beans with a ladleful of their water (if in a jar, drain and rinse them).
3. Cooking “risotto” pasta”
Add the filtered mussel water and, if necessary, a little hot water to the casserole.
When it boils, pour in the tubes.
Cook, stirring frequently, adding hot water if necessary: it should result in a creamy soup.
4. Add the mussels
Halfway through cooking the pasta, add the shelled mussels.
At the end of cooking, adjust the salt (usually very little, because mussels are savoury).
Sauté with a drizzle of oil and a sprinkling of parsley.
🍽 Service
Let it rest 2-3 minutes and serve with a few whole mussels on top. The dish should be creamy and enveloping, not too brothy.
⭐ Variants of the recipe tubettina beans and mussels
🔥 Spicy variant (Pugliese style)
Add fresh chilli peppers to the garlic fry.
At the end of cooking, mantecatura with a drizzle of raw oil and a grating of black pepper.
🍅 Creamier variant
Mash a third of the beans in the casserole with a spoon before adding the pasta.
This creates a velvety “bean cream” type base that binds even better.
🌾 Variant with dried beans
Soak 200 g of beans for 8-12 hours.
Cook them with celery and bay leaves until soft.
Proceed as in the traditional recipe.
💡 Much tastier result!
🦐 Sea and mountain variant
Add some shelled prawns or sautéed pumpkin cubes: they go very well with mussels and beans.
⏱️ Preparation time
Cleaning and opening mussels: 10-12 min
Bean base preparation: 5 min
Cooking time for risotto pasta: 10-12 min
✔️ Total time: 25-30 min
💡 Tips for making it perfect
Never salt before adding the mussel water: you risk making everything too salty.
If the soup dries out too much, add hot water, not cold.
For a richer cream, add a tablespoon of raw oil at the end of cooking.
Avoid mozzarella or cheese: they would cover the flavour of the mussels.
🍷 Matching full menu
🥗 Appetiser
Mussels au gratin or a light seafood salad.
🍝 First
Tubettina fagioli e cozze (main dish).
🐟 Second
Baked fillet of sea bream with lemon and parsley
or
Roasted octopus.
🍰 Dessert
Lemon sorbet or a slice of lemon pastiera/cheesecake.
🍷 Recommended wine
Fiano, Verdeca, Greco di Tufo: fresh, mineral whites, perfect with seafood.
🍽️ Complete menu for 4 persons for a nice meal with friends and family
(combined with the tubettina fagioli e cozze)
🥗 ANTIPASTO - Mussels au gratin
Ingredients
1 kg mussels
120 g breadcrumbs
2 tablespoons pecorino cheese (optional)
Chopped parsley
Chopped garlic (half clove)
Extra virgin olive oil
Pepper to taste.
Preparation
Open the mussels raw by cutting the side hinge (or cook them for 1 minute to open).
Mix breadcrumbs, parsley, garlic, oil and pepper.
Stuff each half mussel and bake at 200°C for 10 minutes.
🍝 FIRST course - Tubettina beans and mussels
Ingredients
320 g tubettini
1 kg mussels
250 g cooked cannellini beans
10 cherry tomatoes
1 clove of garlic
Chilli optional
Olive oil, parsley
Salt to taste.
(Procedure as already provided, if you want I will rewrite it in full).
🐟 MAIN course - Baked sea bream with lemon and parsley
Ingredients
2 giltheads of 500-600 g each
1 lemon
1 clove of garlic
Parsley
3 tablespoons of evo oil
Salt and pepper to taste.
6-8 cherry tomatoes (optional)
Preparation
Slightly carve the sides of the giltheads.
Insert sliced lemon, parsley and crushed garlic into the belly.
Season with salt, pepper and oil.
Bake at 180°C for 25-30 minutes.
🍰 SWEET - Lemon sorbet (very quick)
Ingredients
500 ml ready-made lemon sorbet
150 ml prosecco or 150 ml sparkling water (non-alcoholic version)
Lemon peel
Preparation
Take out the sorbet 5 minutes earlier.
Mix with prosecco (or sparkling water).
Serve immediately with lemon peel.
🍷 RECOMMENDED WINE
Fiano di Avellino, Greco di Tufo or Apulian Verdeca.
Mineral and fresh whites that go perfectly with mussels and sea bream.
🛒 FULL SPENDING LIST (for 4 persons)
🐚 Fish and seafood
2 kg mussels (1 kg for starter + 1 kg for main course)
2 giltheads of 500-600 g each
🫘 Legumes
250 g cannellini beans already cooked (or 1 tin)
🍝 Pasta
320 g tubettini
🍅 Vegetables and fresh
20 cherry tomatoes (10 for the main course + some to decorate the sea bream)
2 lemons
Fresh parsley
Garlic (2-3 cloves)
Fresh or dried chilli pepper (optional)
🧂 Pantry
Breadcrumbs (at least 120 g)
Extra virgin olive oil
Black pepper
Halls
Grated Pecorino cheese (optional for mussels au gratin)
🍧 Sweet
500 ml lemon sorbet
150 ml prosecco or sparkling water (non-alcoholic version)
🍷 Recommended wine (optional)
1 bottle of Fiano, Greco di Tufo or Verdeca
ph Marisa Laurito