Mussels and Crabs for Dinner?

After an excess of meat, meat and more meat, I was ready for something different, something lighter. My first thought was seafood. With a stroke of brilliance, Paul suggested snow crab clusters that were on sale at Giant. $5.99 a pound was absolutely ridiculously cheap for crab. Maybe it was because we were in Baltimore, the crab capital of the world? Who knows, but it was a deal we couldn’t pass up.

And even better, Giant can steam the crabs in-store, seasoned with or without Old Bay. The snow crab claws contain an impressive amount of meat and are easy to break open and eat. They can be enjoyed hot or cold.

Crab legs in hand, something else caught my eye. Mussels were on sale as well, $6 a bag - couldn't pass that up either.

The crabs were ready to eat, but the mussels were still alive. I didn’t realize this, as for some reason I thought that if the shells were open the mussels were dead. As a result, I chucked 10 of them into the trash can. Paul discovered them half an hour later, explaining that if the shells were open, you could tap them on a hard surface. If the mussels were alive, the shells would close.

I decided to make a simple sauce for the mussels, nothing that I had a recipe for, just something I improvised –

-some champagne (just pour it in the pot until it looks like enough)
-a small amount of beer
-a can of tomatoes and one fresh tomato, diced
-a generous amount of garlic powder
-a pinch or two of parley
-ambiguous amounts of salt and pepper

I learned that you don’t need a lot of liquid with which to steam mussels. I combined all of the ingredients in a pot, and waited for it to boil. We steamed the mussels above the mixture in the pot for about five minutes, until the meat inside the shell turned a golden brown color.

In addition to crabs and mussels, I asked Paul to make some of his specialty potatoes. They're in no way healthy, but they really are delicious. He slices russet potatoes into triangle sections, pours olive oil or canola oil into a big saucepan and fries them up until they're golden brown. Afterwards he seasons them with salt and pepper. It's that simple and they made a perfect companion to our seafood dinner.

The meal was a huge success - everything was cooked perfectly. I really liked my mussel sauce too - the champagne cut the acidity of the tomato sauce nicely. And to think - I used to believe you could only get good mussels and crabs in restaurants.