Is mussels high in nitrites?

Watch for

• Moderate histamine (graded C).Shellfish amines climb once the catch comes off ice and cooking does not reverse them, so a bag that spent a warm afternoon in the car is the real variable, not the species
• The "discard anything that did not open" rule is a poor freshness test.A mussel can stay shut simply because its adductor muscle held its grip through cooking. The genuinely meaningful check is before cooking: throw out any raw mussel that gapes and will not close when you tap it, plus anything with a cracked shell or a sour smell
• Debearding kills the animal, so pull the byssus threads just before cooking rather than hours ahead, and store them in the fridge under a damp cloth instead of sealed in a plastic bag or sitting in fresh tap water
• Mildly graded on both salicylates and oxalates (B each).Neither is high enough to lead a reaction on its own, but it is worth logging if a meal is already stacking several borderline foods
• Nickel is unrated for mussels in this data, so treat it as unknown rather than clear if you are working through a systemic nickel diet, since molluscs are a recognised dietary nickel source