Cleaning and cooking land snails is easy: you just need a little bit of time and to follow these easy steps.
First of all, remember to check the label of the product, which must always show the following information: snail species, place of provenance, batch number, pack date, expiration date and storage conditions.
Put onto the heat a pot filled with hot water (4 litres of water per kilo of snails). When the water starts to boil, add the snails, always making sure they are asleep in their shells. If the snails are still moving, put them in the fridge: sleep guarantees the healthiness of the molluscs and maintains intact their organoleptic characteristics by avoiding stress.
Put the lid on the pot and wait for a couple of minutes, then stir and after 2 more minutes the snails are ready. Rinse them with cold water: rinsing snails is important to remove the soil that might still be on the shell.
Take a snail and stick a small fork or a toothpick in its foot, then twist and pull out. If you want, you can save the curly part at the end of the snail’s body. Remove the albumin gland to leave just the foot of the snail. Rinse the shelled snails again in a colander.
Prepare 5/6 litres of Court Bouillon per 1kg of shelled snails, then boil the molluscs in it for approx. 40 minutes. Make sure there’s no slime in the broth and/or on the snails. Drain the snails and, if you aren’t cooking them straight away, put them in a container with water to prevent dehydration. Store in the fridge for maximum 1 day.
Snails are ready to be cooked!!
Maura, owner of “Azienda Agricola 2M”, is going to explain us how to clean and cook land snails.
Step by step tutorial – How to clean land snails
- Recipes you can try straight away!
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- Snail salad
- Snail skewers with leek cream
- Snail bruschette
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