Methods of preparing different types of delicious ready to serve pickled products from green mussel (Perna viridis) and a comparative study of their storage characteristics are reported. Of the three types of products, namely, dried and pickled, fried and pickled and light smoked and pickled, the last one had the best shelf life. The optimum conditions of drying and smoking for preparing such type of pickles are also reported

Devadasan, K.

Joseph, K.G.

Muraleedharan, V.

Aquatic Commons

Fish. Techno!. (1982) 19, 41-43 41 
ickled roducts from reen Mussel 
V. MURALEEDHARAN, K. GEORGE JOSEPH and K. DEVADASAN':' 
Ca/;cut Research Centre of Central Institute of Fisheries Technology, Calicut-673 005 
Methods of preparing different types of delicious ready to serve pickled products 
from green mussel (Perna viridis) and a comparative study of their storage character-
istics are reported. Of the three types of products, namely, dried and pickled, fried 
and pickled and light smoked and pickled, the last one had the best shelf life. The opti-
mum conditions of drying and smoking for preparing such type of pickles are also 
reported. 
Sizeable quantities of green mussel (Perna 
viridis) are landed along the Malabar coast, 
especially from Calicut to north. Presently 
it is fetching only a very poor return to the 
fishermen, as it is consumed by the local 
population only. Very few attempts have 
been made to utilize them properly. Methods 
have been worked out at the Central Insti-
tute of Fisheries Technology for producing 
attractive canned and cured products from 
green mussels (Balachandran & Nair, 1975; 
Muraleedharan et al., 1979). Production 
of ready to serve pickled products from 
mussels appears to be the best method for 
its economic utilisation. Such a product 
will have a very good internal market as a 
table delicacy which in turn fetch better 
return to the fishermen. Different pickled 
products, were thus prepared and their 
storage life are reported. 
Materials and Methods 
Green mussels, collected from the rocky 
Korapuzha estuary, about 10 km from 
Calicut, were brought to the laboratory in 
live condition and washed well in running 
water. They were then placed in sand 
free water for a day, transferred to fresh 
chlorinated water (5 p.p.m. available chlo-
rine) for 2 h which resulted in the complete 
expulsion of sand from the stomach of 
mussels. The meat was then shucked 
alive and analysed for moisture, fat, pro1.ein, 
ash, acid insolubles, calcium and phosphorus 
* Present Address: Central Institute of Fisheries 
Technology, Cochin-682 029 
Vol. 19, 1982 
by the methods of AOAC (1960) and gly-
cogen was estimated by the method of Van 
de Kleiy (1951). The shucked meat was 
blanched in 5% brine for 5 min (750 ml 
. brine for kilogram of meat) and pickled in 
three lots as follows. 
1. Dried and pickled mussels 
The mussel meat was dried over clean 
rust free wire trays in sun to a moisture 
level of 40%. 500 g dried meat was then 
heated with gingelly oil to light brown 
colour. This meat was pickled using con-
diments as given below. 
Partially dried, oil heated meat 
Green chillies (sliced) 
Fresh ginger (sliced) 
Crushed garlic 
Chilly powder 
Turmeric powder 
Refined salt 
Skinned mustard 
500 g 
25 g 
50 g 
25 g 
50 g 
5 g 
25 g 
25 g 
The blended condiments were gently 
heated in gingelly oil and transferred to 
partially dried meat, mixed well in a dry 
container, 100 ml of vinegar added and the 
container closed air tight after pouring some 
oil over the top layer. 
2. Fried and pickled mussels 
The blanched meat (moisture 60 %) was 
directly fried in gingelly oil (without any 
pre-drying) until light brown in colour, 
pickled and stored in containers as described 
above. 
42 V. MURALEEDHARAN, K. GEORGE JOSEPH AND K. DEVADASAN 
3. Smoked and pickled mussels 
Another portion of the blanched meat 
was partially sun dried to 50% moisture 
and smoked in vertical smoke ldln at 
85-90° C for 30 min and moisture brought 
down to a level of 35%. The light smoked 
meat was then pickled and kept in air tight 
dry containers as in the earlier cases but 
only 50 ml vinegar was used. The products 
were periodically analysed for shelf life. 
Results and Discussion 
Table I gives the proximate composition 
of fresh mussel meat. Keeping the live 
mussels in water for a day followed by 2 h 
in chlorinated water facilitated to remove 
the sand from the stomach. Manual 
removal of sand from stomach was time 
consuming which also resulted in distortion 
of meat. 
The recipe employed can be suitably 
altered to suit individual taste. Of the 
Table 1. Proximate composition of mussel 
meat 
Moisture % 
Protein % 
Fat % 
Ash% 
Calcium ~~ 
Phosphorus % 
Acid in&alubles % 
Glycogen % 
82.950 
8.940 
1.950 
1.620 
0.852 
0.325 
0.058 
3.910 
various oils, coconut oil gave a good pro-
duct, ·but it turned rancid easily. Mus-
tard ·oil prevented mould growth effectively. 
But mustard oil taste may not be very much 
relished and hence gingelly oil was preferred. 
Use of skinned mustards along with gingelly 
oil was found sufficient to protect the 
pickle from mould growth without affecting 
the taste and flavour. For those who relish 
mustard oil, mustard oil can be used. 
In the dried and pickled product the 
Table 2. Storage characteristics of mussel pickles 
Storage 
period 
Days 
30 
60 
90 
120 
150 
180 
200 
Fried and 
pickled 
Good 
Good 
Good 
Meat softened, 
acceptable 
Meat softened, 
slight off 
odour, acceptable 
Meat comes off 
easily, stray 
patches of fungus 
on top layer, 
acceptable 
Intense off 
odour, meat 
darkened, fungus 
present, not 
acceptable 
Dried and Smoked and 
pickled pickled 
Good Good 
Good Good 
Good Slight smoky flavour 
Meat slightly Very slight smoky 
softened, flavour, 
acceptable acceptable 
Meat softened, Very slight, 
slight off odour, smoky flavour, 
acceptable acceptable 
Meat comes off Smoky flavour 
easily, fungus on decreased, stray 
top layer, off patches of fungus 
odour, not on top layer, 
acceptable acceptable 
Spoiled Smoky flavour 
further decreased, 
slight off odour, 
stray patches of 
fungus, acceptable 
FISHERY TECHNOLOGY 
GREEN MUSSEL PICKLES 
drying should be stopped at 40% moisture. 
Excessive drying will impart hard texture 
and take more time to mature the .pickle. 
In smoked and pickled products partial 
drying was essential for uniform and proper 
uptake of smoke. Excessive drying and 
smoking are to be avoided. Smoking for 
30 min is found sufficient to impart an 
appealing flavour. 
The storage characteristics of the pro-
ducts are presented in Table 2. The fried 
and pickled product was found to "mature" 
within 2 days in the pickle whereas the dried 
and pickled product took 3 days and the 
smoked and pickled one took 4 days to 
mature. All the products could be stored 
till 6 months. Comparatively, the smoked 
and pickled product had a slightly better 
shelf life and was acceptable even after 200 
days of storage, though the smoky flavour 
was found to be reduced. The dried and 
pickled one softened and disintegrated by 
then. Stray patches of fungus were also 
Vol. 19, 1982 
43 
observed on the top layer. Similar chara-
cteristics were also noticed in the fried and 
pickled product after six months. 
The authors are thankful to the late 
Shri G. K. Kuriyan, Director, Central Institute of 
Fisheries Technology, Cochin for permission to 
publish the paper. 
References 
AOAC (1960) Official Methods of Ana-
lysis. 9th edn. Association of Official 
Agricultural Chemists, Washington 
Balachandran, K. K. & Unnikrishnan Nair, 
T. S. (1975) Proc. Symp. Fish Pro-
cessing Ind. India, CFTRI, Mysore 
Muraleedharan, V., George Joseph, K. & 
Unnikrishnan Nair, T. S. (1979) Fish. 
Techno!. 16, 30 
Van de Kleiy, B. J. (1951) Biochem et 
Biophys. Acta, 481 


Pickled products from green mussel

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Pickled products from green mussel

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