The Magic of Mussels (And Their Troubled Trade)

The Food Programme

BBC

Arts, Food

4.4 • 943 Ratings

🗓️ 4 April 2021

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Dan Saladino finds out how Brexit could wreck plans to turn the mussel into a mainstream food. They're good for our health and the environment so why are producers facing ruin?

From their base in Lyme Bay in South Devon Nicki and John Holmyard grow mussels out at sea. Their pioneering farm, once completed, will be the largest of its kind in European waters, capable of producing ten thousand tonnes of mussels each year. Since January however, they haven't been able to harvest the shellfish which they mostly sell into to Europe. Following Brexit a dispute between the government and the EU has meant the export of much of the UK's live bivalve molluscs (oysters and cockles as well as mussels) has ground to a halt. Dan explains what lies behind this trade dispute and the devastating impact its having on the industry.

Exports into the European Union are essential to mussel farmers in the UK because we eat so little of the shellfish we produce. So why do these bivalves matter? Mary Seddon, a mollusc expert, explains why this source of food was so important to our ancestors and also describes the environmental benefits mussels bring to our coastline.

Belgian food writer Regula Ysewin (pictured) reveals why it was Belgium that fell in love with mussels and also provides a guide to cooking them.

Produced and presented by Dan Saladino.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're about to listen to a BBC podcast and I'd like to tell you a bit about the
0:03.8	podcast I work on. I'm Dan Clark and I commissioned factual podcasts at the BBC.
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0:15.3	What podcasting does is give us the space and the time to take brilliant BBC journalism
0:19.8	and tell amazing compelling stories that really get behind the headlines.
0:23.7	And what I get really excited about is when we find a way of drawing you into a subject
0:28.4	you might not even have thought you were interested in.
0:30.2	Whether it's investigations, science, tech, politics, culture, true crime, the environment,
0:36.1	you can always discover more with a podcast on BBC Sounds.
0:40.0	Hello, you've downloaded a podcast of BBC Radio Falls The Food Programme.
0:44.6	I'm Dan Saladino. Welcome to our world.
0:48.0	From cooking to culture, politics to pleasure.
0:51.2	We hope you enjoy this edition.
0:57.4	Meet Nicki Homyard, someone who grows a lot of food.
1:03.0	My company is offshore shellfish,
1:05.6	with a place in Brixham in the South Coast in Devon.
1:09.5	The food, Nicky and her husband grow, are muscles.
1:13.3	I think the fact that they are environmentally friendly and they're super tasty, they're really easy to cook.
1:19.3	We love eating and we eat so many of them and we introduce lots and lots of people to muscles who probably haven't ever tasted them before and the majority I have to say then like them which is great.
1:30.3	For 30 years the homeyards have farmed these bivalved mollusks.
1:35.0	We were farming in a sea loch on the west coast of Scotland for well over 20 years,
1:41.0	wanted to develop the business to grow more food. My husband decided that he really wanted
	...

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