How to clean mussels and debeard mussels

• You can follow the below instructions on how to clean mussels easily at home before cooking.
• Keep mussels in freshwater
  
• After buying mussels from the market now keep the mussels in a bowl of fresh cold water for about 30 minutes.
• It helps the mussels to breathe and extract excess salt and sand stored inside it's shells.
• Discard any open mussels
  
• After keeping mussels in water, make sure closely cross-check whether your mussels are dead or alive for cooking.
• To check this you can either squeeze them a few times or knock them with another mussel after that if the open mussels do not slowly close.
• Then it is a sign that your mussels are dead. It is safe if you discard them and try the same way with the other one.
• Rinse and Scrub
  
• Now using a firm brush to scrub the mussel's outer shell to remove any additional sand or barnacles.
• Furthermore, rinse the mussels under cool running water and place them inside a container with a damp cloth or paper towel before cooking.
• Remove the beards
  
• If the mussels have beards, use a sharp knife or kitchen scissors to cut them off. This is the tough, stringy part that extends from the shell.
• You know most of the mussels have a common thin, sticky membrane known as "beard", which is made of a lot of fibre that is attached to the mussel's shell.
• To remove the beard from the mussels just hold the mussel in one hand, cover the other hand with a dry paper towel, grasp the beard between your thumb and forefinger and pull it downwards towards the hinged end of the mussel shell.
• In this way, you can easily remove the beard from the mussel without killing them.