Picked/foraged loads of these….

[url=https://flic.kr/p/GVRHvf]Mussels[/url] by jimmyg352, on Flickr

up in NW Scotland with the intention of using them as bait for sea fishing, but they are massive & I thought ‘would these be ok to eat’?
Anyway I have eaten some, (about 15 in white wine & garlic) absolutely gorgeous! But will I start puking at 3am?
Got some giant cockles as well.

Got some giant cockles as well

Stop bragging about them. Everyone is created differently

If anything, only because you’re not used to them, but in essence they’d be fine. As long as they weren’t picked around a muddy harbour.

Mussels should only be eaten in months with an R in them.
Pick them and put them in a bucket of fresh water with some flour for 24 hours and then clean and cook.

I imagine you”ll be fine

Got some giant cockles as well.

That’s a side effect.

You’ll be fine, unless they’ve been sitting in a hot car all day and have all died!

I once stayed at Camusunary bothy, and picked some mussels off the seashore. Without thinking, had a few as they looked so nice. Was fine, but retrospect, risky 🙂

Should be fine – I once scoffed a load picked off a beach opposite Faslane sub base – they were HOOOGE…

Pick them and put them in a bucket of fresh water with some flour for 24 hours and then clean and cook.

This although I was always told oats. That was they clean out nasties and you can identify the dead ones.

Sorry, what’s the flour or oats for?

No they are fab , the fisheries people put up notices on the coast when and where there are issues usually when it is warmer. Best harvested from rocky rather than sandy areas ( or clean as above ) we stayed on Eilean Shona for a week cut off from shops we had no way of restocking alcohol so rationed that but padded our our food with two really good meals of harvested mussels.

http://www.gallowaywildfoods.com/seasonal-notes/april-mussels/

Looks like other people do –

Just ensure they don’t have parasites, can be certain they don’t live near any sort of contamination and avoid months without an R. Seeing as it’s May, er, well… if you’re a 17 inch frame, can I have first dibs on your bike?

How about wild freshwater (swan) mussels? Jnr was paddling in a lake and found loads a year or so ago. I said to put them back but it did make me wonder whether we could have eaten them.

No idea about the oats just something I was told, probably does bog all.

Yes a horrible death, I’m having to sit in the loo in trauma after seeing those horrible things, last time I had turn yourself inside out seafood I lost two days.

Well, I actually had 6 last night & 15 at 5 tonight, still feel fine.

FWIW, I picked them from a remote & secluded part of the western highlands which I don’t think has a sewer outlet or a nuclear power station nearby. I’ve had them from there before but never consumed any till now.
Gave them a quick rinse under cold water & hoyed them in the pan, barnacles included. Got them last Thursday but made sure they were cold at all times.
I’ll be eating seaweed next!

Never seen the appeal of mussels. They are filter feeders. The marine equivalent of eating the hair trap from your shower. 😕

But y’know, I’m sure you’ll be fine…

So how do you suppose ancient man got his mussels before farming and supermarkets? I mean, OK, a few will have died in agony, but most survived.

So how do you suppose ancient man got his mussels before farming and supermarkets?

And sea pollution.

Do scrape off the barnacles and any barnacle like work tubes they smell and taste funny.

It’s odd to think of ‘The filters of the sea’ Prawns, lobsters, oysters and mussels were considered slave food by the Greeks and Romans as they knew what these chaps did for food, and now they are all considered a delicatesy

Go for it. Commercial mussels are no different, except that they are grown on ropes suspended from artificial islands so that the mussels don’t take in any grit or sand. They aren’t treated after collection, either.

I love a good mussel. I do always have to tune out the voice of Mr Robinson, my old Biology teacher, that always returns to tell me that mussel flesh is effectively one giant gonad. He was a bit of a killjoy.

mrlebowski – you were lucky! I grew up next to Faslane submarine base and official advice was not to eat ANY locally-gathered shellfish and that even fish were a bit risky!

Don’t think this was actually anything to do with the base (unless said Fish was glowing green and had more than the usual number of eyes…), just the general state of cleanliness of the Firth of Clyde…

Doesn’t seem to do the local seabirds any harm though. My parents now live almost on the beach and their garden is littered with bits of mussel shell dropped by the birds!

They look a fine size, they grow well next to the under water, hidden to please the tourists, Sewage Outlet 🙂

If you’re not expelling them rapidly within a couple of hours then chances are you’ll be OK.

Please don’t eat the freshwater ones in Scotland, they’re very rare and are protected. Trade in their pearls is banned too, which should gradually help their numbers recover from earlier over-fishing.

I grew up in the SW and cockling / musselling / seine(sp?)-netting for whitebait was a popular childhood past time. I think the idea of 11-15 year olds swimming around in a big semi-circle dragging a net behind them would give the HS Exec a heart attack!

Don’t clean them in fresh water. It kills them and they quickly go rotten.

Fresh sea water is best or if not, salted water to the same ratio as the sea (can’t remember that).

We always put a handful of oats in. No idea why. Probably nonsense but my grandfather had been doing so his whole life too.

It’s worth de-bearding them and scraping the barnacles off. It’s the extra crap that can give the sauce a bitter taste. If you’re killing animals you should put the extra effort in to maximise their deliciousness!

Biggest isn’t always better as they can be a bit tougher. On the other hand, it means they’ve had chance to breed ie. keeping the population sustainable.

You identify the dead ones post-cooking. If they haven’t opened, chuck them.

Cockles are best pickled for accompanying fish and chips.

Biggest isn’t always better as they can be a bit tougher. On the other hand, it means they’ve had chance to breed ie. keeping the population sustainable.

The size of mussels is (partially) dependent on where they grow. Out on a rocky headland battered by the surf they will be smaller as the big ones are too fragile. In a sheltered sea-loch they grow bigger. This does mean that the smaller ones are more likely to be swept by the tides and safer.

Interesting Nico. Thanks.

All of mine came from S. Devon estuaries so sandy bottom, clinging to seaweed or smaller rocks. Plenty of tide but no crashing waves.

Month with an R in it is because the mussels are spawning in the summer and so would lose weight – no real issue with eating then except you might want to eat more.
The Oats thing is just about purging them of grit.

You do need to exercise some care though as 2-3 years ago all Scottish Mussels were deemed unsafe due to water toxicity this was a naturally occurring phenomenon due to algae bloom IIRC – similarly the food poisoning issue at Heston Blumenthals Fat Duck restaurant about 5 years ago was traced back to the mussel farm where he sourced his mussels.

You identify the dead ones post-cooking. If they haven’t opened, chuck them.

Not so, closed ones are fine, throw them back in the pot a bit longer and they’ll open eventually.

Has anyone one checked on the OP ?

Should be o.k sea temps are still low up here , and not a lot of sunshine.
Amnesic shellfish poisoning & paralytic shellfish poisoning probably aint to much to worry about yet. Probably 😀

Yes and no Edukator, although I was more wronger than you.

http://www.popsugar.com/food/Mussels-Myths-Debunked-2439055

Some hilarious conflicting information in here, no wonder people get ill.

There’s a very good reason not to put them in fresh water anyway, which most people should be able to figure out.

There’s a very good reason not to put them in fresh water anyway, which most people should be able to figure out.

I never Googled….honest 😳

The tapping thing I must admit I forgot about.

As for the fresh water thing, they’re not in that long and given they can survive out of water for awhile a bit fresh water does them no harm.

Ah shit! I quoted 24hrs yesterday didn’t I. 😳

Has anyone one checked on the OP ?

I’m here, just got back from hospital (picked the Mrs up from work)

I went off what my book ‘The Edible Seashore’ said, pulled the beards off, rinsed them in cold water, left the barnacles on & chucked them in the pan then scranned them! According to the book the farmed ones are treated after picking by flushing through with sea water thats also been treated through some ultra violent light (or something).
Can’t wait for next year to get some more!