Stuffed Mussels and Fisherman's Eggs (by G)

I've been meaning for ages (approximately since February) to use fancy tin of sardines Biggs got me for my birthday. I've had the recipe on standby for almost as long, but something always crops up. Finally I got my chance.

The eggs are just chicken eggs baked on a bed of shallot, parsley, garlic and sardines. I suspected that a small serve of sardines and eggs does not a meal make, so I also stuffed a few mussels Istanbul style.

It was a relatively fiddly pain in the ass. Locating mussels was most of the problem - the ones I eventually found were pre-blanched, which was not my plan. Many of the bag of mussels had been smashed to pieces - which was not ideal.

The filling is a rice, cinnamon, chilli, currants and... all sorts of other stuff. Stuffing that into the shells was vexing. After that the mussels were steamed, the rice was already overcooked so it probably didn't need that extra cooking time.

Anyway, the mussels were pretty good despite the addition of fruit and spices which I am not particularly fond. In retrospect it would have been simpler, cheaper and better to travel to Istanbul and let them take care of it.

The fisherman's eggs were okay - pretty fishy.