Restaurant· Ksamil, Sarandë & Ksamil
The Mussel House
The Mussel House stands on the shore of Lake Butrint at Qafa e Hartës, on the road from Sarandë to Ksamil. It belongs to a family that has farmed mussels in the lake since 1998, and the restaurant, with wooden cabins beside it, opened in 2017.
Mussels at the source
In 1998 a man born and raised in Sarandë began farming mussels in Lake Butrint, a shellfish long known locally as the queen of the lake. For years the harvest went north to Tirana and Durrës. Now people come to the lake to eat it a short boat ride from the nets.
The restaurant runs a boat tour on the lake to its mussel farm, with the guide speaking Albanian, English or Italian, ending with a mussel tasting and a glass of house white wine.
What to order
Order the mussels several ways: saganaki with tomato, peppers and feta, à la crème, as croquettes, in a soup, or with linguine. Oysters come raw with olive oil and lemon, or gratinated with breadcrumbs, cheese and basil pesto. The lake also supplies grilled fish and grilled Butrint eel, and the seafood risotto, seafood linguine, octopus with capers and roast potatoes, and whole grilled lobster cover the rest of the table.
Getting there from the yacht
The restaurant is on the lake, not the sea, so come ashore at Sarandë harbour or by tender at Ksamil and take a taxi. It is on the SH81 at kilometre 10 south of Sarandë, about 2.4 km from the centre of Ksamil.
Good to know
The Mussel House is open every day from 11:30 to 23:30. Bookings for tables, the cabins and the mussel tour are taken on WhatsApp, and tours run daily when the weather allows. Mussels from the lagoon are at their best from September, as the water cools.