WHICH GARDEN SNAIL IS EDIBLE?

Lets put it this way, we can eat garden snails and they are delicious. People got a little turned off when we posted on how to clean and detox your snails for cooking, saying it is cruel. But what is not? Is eating chicken less cruel than hibernating snails and then cooking them? Strange readers we have. Anyway, here are some visual tips on how to identify these free delicacies in your garden. Not for the weak-hearted.

Helix aspersa, known by the common name garden snail, is a pulmonate gastropod that is one of the best-known of all terrestrial molluscs. It has two recent synonyms: Cornu aspersum and Cantareus aspersus.^[3]

Although this species is edible, it is often regarded as a pest in gardens, especially where it has been accidentally introduced.

The species is an agricultural and garden pest, an edible delicacy, and occasionally a household pet.

In French cuisine, it is known as petit gris, and is served as escargot. The snails are farm-raised or bred as a hobby and eaten with garlic butter or cream sauces. Their texture is slightly chewy. The practice of rearing snails for food is known as heliciculture.

Recently, this snail has gained popularity as the chief ingredient in skin creams and gels (crema/gel de caracol) sold within the Latino community and used for wrinkles, scars, dry skin, and acne.
We posted the below a while back :

 

FREE DELICACY IN YOUR GARDEN : SNAILS

We watched an old series of Gordon Ramsay and got inspired by his passion to rear his own food. In one of the episodes, he researched snails and found out that those edible buggers are available in all our gardens. All they need is a merely detox to rid whatever nasty things they might have eaten in the garden that contains chemicals and all.

We are extremely cite about that. But we do have to research more into it as the garden snails found in our region has a pointy shell. Not sure if that is an edible species although this site did mention that all land snails are edible. Read more about it here.

I would suggest gathering the snails right after or even during a heavy rain. Snails like to come out onto the sidewalk when it rains (they probably don’t like drowning). If you don’t anticipate rain anytime soon, you can spray the yard down with a garden hose and then wait awhile for the little guys to come crawling out. I don’t know how long it takes them to come out when it gets wet, but they are snails, so it’ll probably take a few hours.

First, wash the snails with water.

After you’ve gathered your snails, place them in a jar with a tight fitting lid and a few holes for breathing and leave them alone for two days without feeding them. You want to make sure you don’t skip this step as it’s the detoxification process and will allow your snails to purge any toxins they’ve consumed recently.

Gordon suggests putting a carrot in their jar after two days of detox and leaving them until their poo starts turning orange. I’ve also heard that you can feed them cornmeal which is supposed to make them taste good (I’m going to go with Gordon’s suggestion on this one).

After they’re pooing orange, put them in an airtight jar and leave them in the fridge until they stop moving. Your snails are now ready to cook!