Stuffed Musseles ( Midye dolmasi)
This is an easy but time-consuming dish, however if you like Mediterranean food and mussels, you would take time to do it at home. We do prefer making home because cleaning, cooking, and stuffing the mussels is critical and must be done as quick as possible. Always buy a fresh mussel (keep cold) and make the dish as soon as possible Prepare the filling in advance and fill in the mussels as soon as cleaning and separating the shell process is done. Ingredients: I had 60 ea. mussels Filling: 1 C short grain white rice 2 medium onions 1/3 C olive oil 1/4 C pine nuts 1/4 C currents 1/2 C small chopped parsley 1/4 C chopped dill 1/2 Tbsp. chili pepper 1/2 Tbsp. paprika 1 Tbsp. Tbsp. cinnamon 1/2 Tbsp. allspice 1/2 Tbsp. turmeric 1 Tbsp. Himalayan salt 1 Tbsp. ground black pepper 1/2 Tbsp. grounded nutmeg A Few saffron strings (soaked in a Tbsp. of warm water) 1/2 Lemon juice Making: Rinse the rice well but you don’t need to soak in the salt water. Dice the onions into small pieces. Heat the oil in a shallow large pan on medium heat, sauté the onions until they become translucent. Add currents, lower the heat and keep sautéing few more minutes, Add pine nuts, stir and sauté another few minute slightly brown the pine nuts. Squeeze a half of the lemon juice Fold the rice in and keep sautéing. Add all the spices, salt and pepper at once. Add 3/4 C Cups of water. Bring the heat back to medium, let rice comes to boiling point, lower the heat and cook the rice for 10 minutes. Rice still must be somewhat watery (not like a rice pilaf) Add parsley and dill stir evenly. Take it off the heat, and let it cool. Preparing mussels: Make sure mussel is tightly close until you are ready to process it. Dead mussel (which shell is open) should not be consumed. Brush each mussel under cold water with a stiff kitchen brush few times rinse thoroughly. Still in ice cold water Hold each mussel very sturdy pull the beard to from tip to hinge (towards to the bottom part of the mussel). Insert the clam knife between the shells from the top to the bottom. (at this moment if you drop the mussel into the warm water, it may help the separation of the shells.) Do not separate the shells altogether! As Leaving a mussel on one side of the shell fill each shell with about tablespoon or two (depends on size of the shell) of rice filling. At this point you have choice of
After all shells are filled and wrapped. Line them up in the pan. Pour a cup of water. and cook on medium heat for 15 Min. Let it cool down and untie all the shells before serving. Serve with lemon wedges. 4/1/2021 Back to Sea Food Page Preparing and Filling Mussels.
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Preparing Rice Filling
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