Mussels disaster. Little help please

SaltySam

Tried cioppino today.  Followed a recipe and added shrimp, cod, clams, and crab meat.  The cioppino dishes I’ve seen on TV or YouTube had mussels as well.  I love them, so I figured I’d give it a shot. 

Watched one video on prepping mussels and got to work.  Seemed simple enough.  Rinse, then pick out the ones that aren’t sealed tightly.  Put several tablespoons of water in a pot, cover and cook on high until they open. 

I got just shy of two pounds for about $7.00.  More than half were already wide open.  They smelled fishy, of course. But, some of them were pretty rank.  The ones that were sealed cooked quickly. When I took the lid off, I about gagged.  They smelled rancid.  Needless to say, I didn’t add them to the soup.  In fact, they are still out on the patio in the pot they cooked in.
Possibly the worst smell to ever come out of my kitchen.

They were on ice at the grocery store. He bagged them up, and I put them in the fridge for several hours. Was that my mistake?  Or was my mistake buying seafood in Nebraska?

Did I screw it up, or did I get a bad batch?

 

dmchicago

seafood in Nebraska?

Yes. 

sumoconnell

If you picked out more than a few open ones, it's a bad batch.. half is a lot. I don't think the ice was the issue. 

How was the soup? Cool cook.

Sea2Ski

Bad batch. 
Those that are open before cooking are no problem. Just manually squeeze the shell like a Pac-Man action and if they close by themselves, it is fine. If not, toss. 
If closed and do not open after steaming, toss.

Also, once bought put in the fridge, do not put in cooler with ice unless there is no other option. 

Do do not give up, mussels are great and I make them often. 

CornfedMA

dmchicago said:

seafood in Nebraska?

Yes. 

@dmchicago This made me laugh. When I graduated college and started traveling for business, my old man, who traveled just about every week of my life, gave me some valuable travel advice. “Don’t order clam chowder in Denver.” 

@SaltySam   Don’t get discouraged. If you’re into mussels and live in Nebraska, find a good market that turns over their inventory regularly. Also, one thing I find a lot of grocery stores do with their shellfish when someone buys them, is to bag them in an airtight plastic bag. Then a lot of folks take them home and throw them in the fridge for a day. This is bad. Those little guys need to breathe! When they stop breathing, they start smelling bad. Kinda like people...

CornfedMA

Sea2Ski said:

Bad batch. 
Those that are open before cooking are no problem. Just manually squeeze the shell like a Pac-Man action and if they close by themselves, it is fine. If not, toss. 
If closed and do not open after steaming, toss.

Also, once bought put in the fridge, do not put in cooler with ice unless there is no other option. 

Do do not give up, mussels are great and I make them often. 

Good advice here too. If they’re open, I just give them a tap on the inside of the sink, if they close, you’re good. 

Spillin

FWIW if you had them in a sealed plastic bag for an extended period of time you can kill them..  Learned that one the hard way...

SaltySam

They were wrapped in butcher paper and plastic wrap from the seafood counter. I don’t know that they were airtight, but definitely not breathing.  I did the tap on the counter thing, but most were wide open.  

The soup was actually decent.  Chopped the onions a little too thick.  This recipe calls for two medium onions, and only 4-5 hours on low.  The onions in the dish are a little crunchy.  If I do it again, I’ll dice them up finer, or maybe sauté them first.  

I took one picture of the of the crock pot to show my brother.  It’s not the most artistic work of mine.  Definitely better the next day, after adding salt and pepper.

KiterTodd

These days, with proper refrigeration for transport, you should be able to buy shellfish anywhere.  However, I think mussels have a long shelf life and that gets abused. Plus, the further you get from the sea the less the people handling it and selling it really know how to keep it and when to toss it.

Fresh is key.  If the bag in the store has more than a few already wide open, skip it.

I scrub them, pull the beards off, and then throw them right in with whatever sauce I'm cooking.  They'll cook quickly and any juices left inside will flavor your broth. So it's nice to cook them in the sauce, plus the meat will take on more flavor from whatever you are cooking it in AND if you have citrus, garlic or wine in your stock it'll help to cut down any "fishy" scent they may have.

Thanks for the share.  Good discussion.

ColbyLang

No fresh seafood unless you’re near the ocean!!!! Temperature adulteration happens daily. You gotta really really trust your fish market or grocer to buy seafood that isn’t IQF

JethroVA

Spillin said:

FWIW if you had them in a sealed plastic bag for an extended period of time you can kill them..  Learned that one the hard way...

Yep, they're alive and need to breathe. Same reason you don't let the ice melt.  They deplete the oxygen in the water and die.