H&RHEscargots

Snail pizza

2012-02-02T10:14:00.000-08:00

For some reason, I didn't know that pizza didn't have to have tomatoes on it! Apparently the Italians put all sorts of things on a pizza base. Helen Parkins (@A Kentish Kitchen ) made a wonderful pizza with purple sprouting broccoli, fried onions, roquefort, parma ham, some of my snails salt and pepper and fried sage leaves crumbled over the top. It has inspired me to try all sorts of other combinations. Helen suggested black kale, turnip tops or nettle instead of the purple sprouting and I wondered about using small fish like fresh anchovies or something caught in waters around the British Isles like small sardines.

We began our feast with Helen's sobrasada mash which is, as she says, comfort food. The bright pink sausage is combined completely with creamy mash potato and then served with hot buttery snails - a real winner!

Helen suggested treating cooked snails as though they were squid. She showed me a Malaysian recipe for squid which we thought could be adapted. It uses hot red chillies, paprika, shrimp or anchovy paste, garlic and onion, sugar and lime or lemon juice. We didn't have time to try it today but I think it is definitely worth a go.

My cider recipe for cooking snails

2012-02-01T06:07:00.000-08:00

Alcohol is an essential ingredient in cooking my locally grown edible snails and here is how to use the local cider. The flavour of home cooked snails will beat anything you've tasted on holiday.

Make your cooking stock with the following ingredients:
1oo ml cider
1 litre water
1 crushed clove garlic,
chopped shallot,
chopped carrot,
sea salt and black pepper
1 clove, 1 bay leaf, small sprinkling of cinnamon and nutmeg,chopped parsley and thyme (could be dried or fresh)1 whole bird’s eye chilli (don’t break it up or the stock could be too hot)
(One litre of stock would cook a kilo of snails.)

Make a 10% brine preferably with sea salt

Bring a large pan of water to rapid boil and add salt. Drop the sleeping snails into the boiling water and bring back to the boil for five minutes. Plunge them into cold water after blanching so that you can handle the shells to remove the snail using a fork. Twist the snail following the shape of the shell to remove it and rinse in cider vinegar to loosen the slime.

Drop the de-shelled snails into hot brine and boil for thirty minutes to remove slime.

Remove the snails from the brine and drop them into the hot stock. Bring back to the boil and simmer for about one and a half hours. I use a slow cooker for this part of the process so that I can be sure they will simmer and won’t boil dry.

At the end of the cooking process turn off the heat and leave cooked snails in the hot stock while you prepare the garlic butter.

For the garlic butter:
Per 250 gm pack unsalted English butter (taken out of the fridge well ahead of time) which should do 5 or 6 dozen snails, depending on how much you like garlic butter.
20gm chopped garlic
40 gm chopped shallot
Freshly picked parsley – enough to colour it green
Add cider to taste but try 70 ml

The herbs, garlic and shallot are most easily chopped in a food processor with the cider unless you are a skilled chef. Then mix well with the butter.Drain the snails well and reheat with the cider butter in a hot oven in an oven proof dish until the butter bubbles. Served with crusty bread and a side salad.

Smoked snails

2012-01-29T00:57:00.000-08:00

Smoked food is very popular in Britain and I like smoked snails very much. I cook the snails in local cider first in the usual way, then transfer them to a sweet cure for a few minutes while they are still hot. If you leave them too long they will be too salty. Twenty minutes in one of those small domestic smokers is enough to impart a good smokey flavour without damaging the soft texture. I put brown sugar in the seasalt cure to give a little sweetness and smoke some garlic with the snails so I can pack them with the garlic and fresh thyme in local rapeseed oil. I kept an apple theme by using local cider in the cooking process and apple wood for smoking.

They could be vacuum packed if you don't want to eat them straight away. Smoked foods do freeze well but you don't want to damage the texture. I tried bottling them but it wasn't a good idea!

Eat them cold.

Cooking snails

2012-01-23T05:26:00.000-08:00

Take your Snayles (they are no way so as in Pottage) and wash them very well in many waters, and when you have done put them in a White Earthen Pan, or very wide Dish, and put as much water to them as will cover them, and then set your Dish or Pan on some coales, that it may heat by little and little, and then the Snayles will come out of the shells and so dye, and being dead, take them out and wash them very well in Water and salt twice or thrice over; then put them in a Pipkin with Water and Salt, and let them boyle a little while in that, so take away the rude slime they have, then take them out againe and put them in a Cullender; then take excellent sallet Oyle and beat it a great while upon the fire in a frying Pan, and when it boyls very fast, slice two or three Onyons in it, and let them fry well, then put the Snayles in the Oyle and Onyons, and let them stew together a little, then put the Oyle, Onyons, and Snayles altogether in an earthen Pipkin of a fit size for your Snayles, and put as much warm water to them as will serve to boyle them and make the Pottage and season them with Salt, and so let them boyle three or foure hours; then mingle Parsley, Pennyroyall, Fennell, Tyme, and such Herbs, and when they are minced put them in a Morter and beat them as you do for Green-sauce, and put in some crums of bread soaked in the Pottage of the Snayles, and then dissolve it all in the Morter with a little Saffron and Cloves well beaten, and put in as much Pottage into the Morter as will make the Spice and bread and Herbs like thickening for a pot, so put them all into the Snayles and let them stew in it, and when you serve them up, you may squeeze into the Pottage a Lemon, and put in a little Vinegar, or if you put in a Clove of Garlick among the Herbs, and beat it with them in the Morter, it will not tast the worse; serve them up in a Dish with sippets of Bread in the bottom. The Pottage is very nourishing, and they use them that are apt to a Consumption.

The Compleat Cook, Nathaniel Brook, 1658

Reptile Food

2012-01-04T12:08:00.000-08:00

In every clutch of snails there are some that never grow properly and can't be sold for human consumption so I sell them for reptile food. There are some lizards that like snails: skink, tegu and monitors. I believe some turtles eat them too.

I sell the snails in small quantities: 100 gm by weight and you can choose what size you want to suit your particular reptile pet. If you want larger quantities that can usually be arranged - just email and ask. www.snailfarm.org.uk

Of Molluscs and Me

2011-12-20T01:14:00.001-08:00

Today I was copied in to a discussion between two conservationists concerned about the fate of Helix pomatia on the Kent Downs. The problem seems to be predation, possibly by the glow worm, though this is not definitely established. The numbers of Roman snails, as we call them, have fallen in a particular location - lots of empty shells have been found. Romans snails are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 and glow worms are also rare. So if one rare species is killing the other rare species this leaves conservationists with an interesting dilemma. Is it legal to protect the snails by destroying the glow worms? I look forward to hearing the answer as it is relevant to the struggle I have to protect my snails from the attention of shrews. Further information on Helix pomatia from http://roman-snail.co.uk

Of Molluscs and Me

2011-12-04T07:10:00.000-08:00

I've been experimenting with organic coir blocks from Fertile Fibre: www.fertilefibre.com. I'm using it in the polytunnel in the baby snail pens partly because the compost worms like it and it lightens the soil which can get very compacted. But I also like it because it holds water well to keep the humidity up and I am all in favour of farming solutions that avoid the use of peat. It is nice and light to handle too. The only downside is that it's imported ...but if we wait a few years we may even be growing our own coconut trees!

Snails with sobrasada mash

2011-11-26T10:36:00.000-08:00

A new recipe for the book given to me by A Kentish Kitchen.

Sobrasada is a soft Mallorcan sausage, like pate and flavoured with Paprika to give it a deep red colour. You could make your own English version of pork pate but don't forget the paprika!

Mash potatoes with some sobrasada sausage and pour over it at the point of serving, cooked snails in garlic and herb butter.

Sweet potato can be used instead of ordinary potatoes if you prefer.

Of Molluscs and Me

2011-11-25T11:25:00.000-08:00

I caught myself photographing worms today. These Dendrabaenas are fascinating because they seem to like climbing. They are supposed to be cleaning up the soil in the snail pens for me but every day I find more up at the top under the lid. The snails collect together in clumps and if I pick up a clump there is nearly always a worm curled up in there too.

Of Molluscs and Me

2011-11-21T08:42:00.000-08:00

I can't believe it is so long since I wrote a blog. I just love this picture of baby snails. It is the translucent bodies and shells and the pale grey streak running down the antennae which I guess is the nervous system connected to their eyes. I'm taking orders now for mini snail farms with 6 cute babies for Christmas gifts.

Snail Smallholder kit

2011-03-22T12:33:00.000-07:00

If you want to rear a few snails in your back garden or allotment read on. This is an opportunity for snail eaters to grow their own food. I will supply baby snails, an attractive predator proof pen for them to live in for the summer and a Smallholder Guide telling you what you need to know. Put it alongside your chicken run and have fun. www.snailfarm.org.uk

Saturnalia

2010-12-23T00:55:00.000-08:00

Snails don’t do Christmas. They don’t want their antennae trimmed with baubles or flashing lights or their houses lit up with a jolly Santa complete with reindeer and sleigh. They wouldn’t know what to do with a sprig of mistletoe. For them Christmas Day is just another day. You don’t have to think about what to get them this year. They are the creatures who already have everything.

The winter solstice is very welcome when at long last the mornings and evenings start to get lighter. When edible snails were first brought to Britain by the Romans, this time of year was the festival of Saturnalia. There was lots of cross dressing and role reversal so being hermaphrodite would have had its advantages.

If you want to cook snails the Roman way you have to fatten them on milk. They were then fried in oil and served dressed with wine and liquamen, a sauce made from the fermented entrails of fish. Bon appetit!

Nanowrimo

2010-11-02T09:23:00.000-07:00

Hibernation is a wonderful concept. I often think when it's cold outside that I'd like to just snooze the winter away. The temperature fell to minus three the week before last so the snails all had to come in from the cold. They were eating less and less outside so they'd stopped growing. Most are now crated up in my outhouse for the winter, but at the moment it is quite mild so they aren't asleep and probably wondering what's going on. It is only Autumn really and a wonderful one too with strong autumn colour on the trees.

And for me Nanowrimo is here! Let me explain: November is National Novel Writing Month and this year I have joined. I've cleared my desk and set myself the target of writing 50,000 words in November - that's 1666 words a day. I'm not writing a novel I have to confess: 'Of Molluscs and Me' is all about setting up and running the snail farm. I've been working on it for years a bit at a time but this is my chance to really get to grips with it. It's ages since I last spent any good length of time on it and I have to write about all the things that have happened this summer.

The clocks changing last weekend made things easier as I'm a morning person and I still wake according to the old time. If I start writing by 7.15 and eat breakfast at the same time, I can get my word count done by 8.30 or so and then get on with the rest of the day. What I've found is that when I write early like this, and resist the temptation to look at my emails first, my brain is still in the right mode to free write. It's like limbering up - going for a mental jog - so much better for my knees than a real one! Then I go on thinking of ideas during the day and jot things down as they come into my head. I've found less need to have the radio on once my brain is in writing mode. So here's to National Novel Writers everywhere!

Snail versus shrew

2010-08-08T00:36:00.000-07:00

So far I have caught five tiny shrews just by picking them up with gloved hands and transferring them unhurt to a field not far away. I am just hoping there aren't any more as they seem to have eaten a lot of baby snails. I haven't actually caught them red-clawed but they were snuggled up with the snails and surrounded by empty shells which seems fairly decisive to me. Shrews are carnivorous and are supposed to eat earthworms and insects but in this hot dry weather I guess you can't get an earthworm for love nor money so it looks like they held their noses and turned to nice juicy snails.

Dusty and her mate Freddie ferret are helping to protect the snails by spreading their wonderful odour about the place, in the hope that the shrews will take the hint and dine elsewhere. I have some more baby snails in the nursery waiting to go out but I don't want to take them until I'm sure it is safe.

The good news is that the first of this year's snails have 'shelled': the front edge of the shell has turned up like the brim of a hat to show they've stopped growing. They've grown fantastically well outside where they have more space than indoors and a good diet of dry food supplemented by lots of waste fruit and vegetables.

Visitor numbers to the farm have increased now the summer holidays are here and UKTV were filming here last Monday. Look out for us in the Autumn on the Good Food Channel programme Market Kitchen with chef Mark Sargeant, formerly at Claridge's with Gordon Ramsey and now at The Swan at West Malling.

Cherry flavoured snails?

2010-07-24T23:04:00.000-07:00

For a few short weeks this day tent provided shelter from the sun, wind and rain - though we didn't get much rain. Then one night a strong gust of wind blew it away.

But the Cherry Festival was fun. Lots of people crowded in to meet the snails who were feasting on waste cherries from the packhouse. The snails haven't turned noticeably pink yet. In between showing everyone round I did a cookery demonstration and sold hot snails as well as bottled: both flew of the shelves.

We made our presence felt at the Kent County Show the following weekend. I put together some snail rearing kits for people to buy with half a dozen baby snails and all they need. Hot and bottled snails sold well and I made lots of good contacts to take the snails on visits and give talks.

The next big event will be the Smallholding Fair at Sissinghurst 21 and 22 August. This is a first for me and I'm really looking forward to showing the snails in such wonderful surroundings.

In the meantime, I have a shrew to re-home. It has somehow got through the defences and taken up residence in the snail enclosure. On the whole I like small furry animals, but if they eat snails they have to go! Catching it alive is proving difficult so if anyone has any suggestions I would be pleased to hear from you.

Visit Faversham

2010-07-02T01:17:00.000-07:00

June was very busy and I can hardly believe it is already July. Lots of things have happened:

This lovely picture was taken at Sandwich when I took the snails along for Le Weekend - their twinning event.

We've made it onto the visitor attraction websites: http://www.canterbury.co.uk/things-to-see-and-do/Faversham-Slow-@-Grow,-Slow-Summer-Snail-Farm/details/?dms=13&feature=1&venue=3037860&easi=true
In June we also featured in an article in Speciality Food Magazine with a picture of me with the Natalia and the snails.

We've applied to register with the Children's University as a Learning Destination and now have worksheets for children to do alongside drawing and handling the snails. I also hope to become registered in the Autumn as an external provider to schools but I have to do some training first.

The website brings in some fascinating enquiries: one was from a school in Tenby where the children are studying Applied Science. As part of that curriculum they have to look after animals and we are discussing the idea that they could have some baby snails for a term and then return them to me. This fits well with the snail rearing mini-kits I am currently building for sale at the County Show. Look out for more details on the website.

Snail Farm Open

2010-06-06T00:56:00.000-07:00

What's behind the door? To find out you will have to come and see for yourself. The snails started moving in on 29th May as planned and we have had lots of visitors wandering down the the end of the garden centre to find out what's going on. I was musing on the concept of freedom food and decided it really couldn't apply to snails. The bird netting, metal barrier sunk into the ground and electric fencing are essential if I want to find the snails still there waiting for their breakfast each day. So far I have managed to keep the free range chickens out but a sparrow blundered in by mistake one hot afternoon. It sat for a while looking round with amazement and eventually worked out where the door was.

The ground has been seeded and with last night's rain it should start to green up soon, though the thistles, dock and bindweed are doing quite well. I hope the ground is green soon as we have TV cameras coming in a couple weeks time.

The snails will be visiting Sandwich for a couple of days for Le Weekend 12/13 June: http://www.open-sandwich.co.uk/events/leweekendl.htm so Slow@ Grow will be closed for those days.

The next events on the Brogdale calendar will be Soft Fruit day on 27 June and then the Cherry Festival 10/11 July. I am planning a cookery demonstration for the Cherry Festival. Then the following weekend is the county show so I will be in Maidstone for three days 16/17 and 18 July and Slow @ Grow will be closed for those few days too.

Building the farm

2010-05-21T01:54:00.000-07:00

Chris and his team from Willow Landscapes have made rapid progress with building the farm enclosure, though the lovely warm weather has probably helped.

We had half a page in Your Swale this week:
http://edition.pagesuite-professional.co.uk/ see page 8/9.

KM online want to make a video when we are open and Great British Food Magazine plan to publish a piece about us too.

I will be running Slow Summer Snail Farm on my own which means that I will not always be there. However I will need to go there at some point most days to feed the snails. I will fit that in with my other work commitments but I am most likely to be there in the afternoon during the week but longer at weekends. There is a phone number if visitors want to check when I will be there: 07811395974 and I would like groups to book. The 50 p per child charge reflects the focus at this stage of the year on providing an educational experience for children. For this introductory period I will charge £1 for anyone over 16. Children under 3 would not be charged for.

The snails will be particularly pleased to see you if you come bearing gifts. They like the stalks of cabbage, cauli and broccoli - the bits you throw away, along with that apple that has been sitting in the fruit bowl too long or the odd carrot. When the veg growing season really gets underway they would be delighted if there was a glut of courgettes or your lettuces bolted. Whatever it is in the waste fruit and veg line - bring it along and find out what they like best.

Slow Summer Snail Farm

2010-05-17T06:00:00.000-07:00

We're making progress at Slow Summer Snail Farm. The ground has been cleared and rotivated ready for construction work to begin on Wednesday. Press releases and leaflets are going out and attracting lots of excitement locally. It's a nail-biting time with the opening planned for Saturday 29th May.

The Real Food Fair at Earls Court was a fascinating experience last week. It was like a big farmer's market with several stalls from local Kent producers.

The website is coming along now so watch this space: www.snailfarm.org.uk.

Life in the slow lane

2010-05-02T01:57:00.000-07:00

http://www.pressup.biz:80/clients/ten/canterbury-times---life-in-the-slow-lane.html

The local papers have all picked up the story about our trip to Belgium.

There was a Family Fun Day and Hog Roast at Brogdale yesterday, so I was able to tell lots of people that the snails are coming. The children were having their faces painted and riding up and down on the mini railway. A wet bank holiday Sunday is no surprise of course, but we've been promised a fine day tomorrow. So I'll be back out meeting the public and spreading the good news. I'm planning to offer a snail cookery course soon, to show people how good snails can be when you cook them slowly in plenty of Kentish cider.

Publicity snakes and ladders

2010-04-29T00:25:00.000-07:00

April has involved us in a lot of press activity. Last week the Kent Messenger newspapers in the Canterbury area featured an article with pictures covering our visit to Tavola XPO, a big trade exhibition in Belgium. (photo (c) jules serkin www.Pressup.biz) I went with Simon from Rough Old Wife Cider and Jane of Canterbury Cheesemakers, with the support of Natalia at Canterbury City Council. The aim was to explore the feasibility of exporting Kentish products across the channel. We learnt a lot about the markets in Belgium and France and the publicity was very welcome. Although we found Welsh lamb and Irish butter on display there was no great enthusiasm for English products.

This was also reflected in the piece on BBC TV last night where a local French chef tried to demonstrate that tinned French snails were superior to fresh English ones. If he had cooked them properly of course the story would have been quite different. When I went to France last year and met Emmanuel Brasseur at his well respected snail farm near Boulogne, he told me that he meets many French people who have suffered badly cooked snails. Like me, he cooks his snails slowly for a long time in a well flavoured stock. He uses French wine and I use English cider but otherwise our recipes are very similar. The snails of course are the same and the truth is that if you cook them properly you get a good flavour and soft texture, whether you cook them in France or in England. If you get them out of a tin of course, who know how they've been cooked! What a pity the TV programme did not show a more balanced view.

Slow at Grow

2010-04-27T11:22:00.000-07:00

Great news! This summer the baby snails will be outside in the fresh air at Brogdale near Faversham. We have been lucky enough to be offered a site for the snail farm in ‘Grow’ the garden centre at the back of the plant centre next to the community allotments.

This is the 'before' view of the site.

The chickens seemed to think I was moving the bark chippings just for their benefit. We still have to take down the old hen house but they’ve already moved to smart new accommodation a few yards away. Today we started clearing the site for construction work to begin and look forward to opening to the public at the end of May. By then we hope frosts will be over so the snails can live happily outside.

So raise your glasses to Slow at Grow: the only open snail farm in Britain!

First Day of Spring

2010-03-01T03:54:00.000-08:00

1 March certainly feels like the first day of Spring on the snail farm. We're keeping our fingers crossed for the first batches of eggs to be laid this coming weekend. On Saturday we started setting up the enclosures in the barn so the babies will be able to go into their new home at the end of April. As soon as it is warm enough they will be living outside this year. For the first time we’ll try out the rearing method used in Northern France and Belgium. Keeping birds and rodents away will probably be the biggest challenge but we’re looking forward to reducing our human labour input. Meanwhile we're relying on our workforce to put lots of labour into laying.

Multiplication

2010-02-22T05:11:00.000-08:00

The first phase of our expansion plans has begun. New breeding stock arrived last Thursday in a large cardboard box to join our own adults which had grown through the winter. The snails looked remarkably calm after being stuck in the post for 8 days. They were packed in two mesh sacks but some had escaped and were busily munching their way through the newspaper packaging. As soon as they were given their freedom they started to pair off without even waiting for breakfast. Mating was more important than food and water - which is good news for us. All we can do now is keep our fingers crossed that egg laying follows soon.

a snail Valentine

2010-02-05T09:38:00.000-08:00

We can’t pretend that snails have aphrodisiac properties but they could make the perfect starter for a romantic meal.

SPECIAL OFFER

CROQUILLES D’ESCARGOTS: create attractively presented sweet or savoury dishes with edible wafer shells . Box of 1200 £75.00. Will split.

Live Kentish snails Helix aspersa maxima, fully prepared ready for cooking @ 30p each. Only a few hundred left. Cleaned and ready to go. Special delivery costs £8.65 for up to 2 kg.

Blanched and blast frozen snails, removed from the shells ready for you to cook @ £35 per kilo plus delivery.

Smoked snails: poached with Kentish cider, cured in sea salt and brown sugar, smoked over apple wood, served cold in rapeseed oil with smoked garlic and thyme @ £5.00 per dozen. Freshly prepared to order and supplied chilled or vacuum packed and frozen.

Canapés: cooked snails in garlic and herb butter in edible shells (chilled or frozen) @ £5.00 per dozen.

News:
Expansion plans – the market for home grown snails is developing and the farm is growing with it. This year we plan to raise 100,000 babies outdoors in the summer months. So keep your fingers crossed for good snail weather!

Look out for us in the Times-on-line newspaper: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/related_features/my_dinner_party/article6915702.ece

Adopt a snail

2009-10-25T10:49:00.000-07:00

Adopt a snail is the latest slogan to appear on our stalls. Jim Hunter of Aylesford, a master wood craftsman, has produced some beautiful snails for us to sell. We have three versions. The top one is sycamore with the pattern of a shell burnt into it. The middle one is plain pale sycamore and the lower one is made in oak. Jim has used the grain of the wood to represent the shell in these two.

We are looking forward very much to appearing at West Malling Farmer's Market www.westmallingfarmersmarket.co.uk on the fourth Sunday of each month starting in November. We will be serving hot snails in garlic butter as well as selling snail canapes and smoked snails for you to take away and eat at home. The wooden snails will be on sale there but can also be ordered by phone or email and sent by post.

Live snails are currently available from Derek the butcher at the Goods Shed Butchery in Canterbury. He has them for sale on Saturdays and they can be ordered at any time.

Rachel's Deli

2009-08-31T00:34:00.000-07:00

On Saturday I was at Rachel's Deli (http://www.rachelsdeli.co.uk) to give customers the opportunity to taste my smoked snails. It was a lovely warm day and groups of people drifted in and out on their way to and from the Secret Garden Restaurant, Ibbidi Bobbidi Boo gift shop and all the other outlets.

If you haven't yet discovered Mersham Le Hatch Business Village (http://www.mershamlehatch.com/) then I can recommend a trip. Near Ashford and the M20/A20 it is in a courtyard of attractive outbuildings formerly part of Lord Brabourne's estate. This is a group of shops that definitely deserves a closer look.

Rachel is now stocking my smoked snails and garlic butter canapes in the freezer, both perfect for dinner parties and special occasions at home. A lot of the fresh meats and vegetables stocked are organic and sourced locally but there is also a good range of charcuterie, wine and cheeses from across Europe. The tomatoes are so fresh they are still growing in pots outside the window.

Allotment Escargots

2009-08-26T00:36:00.000-07:00

Snails have made a nutritious contribution to the human diet for 17,000 years. If you are concerned about the environment then you should consider using this natural resource from your garden or allotment.

This book is for you if you are interested in:
· collecting free food from the wild,
· growing your own fruit and vegetables
· buying locally produced food,
· reducing food miles
· lowering your carbon emissions
· eating well

Find out how to:
· rear local snails for your own consumption
· keep the snails in and everything else out
· decide what to plant for your family and your snails
· collect, prepare and eat your snails
…and lots more.

Published by H&RH Escargots © 2009 Price £5

Writing the Book

2009-08-15T03:27:00.000-07:00

Coming out and saying I'm writing a book feels like a big step even though I've been writing for years: making my living as a writer indeed for some time. but whenever I talk to people about the snail business they ask when the book's coming out. 'There's got to be a book in it', they say... and maybe there is.

I went to a book launch last night for Katherine May's first novel Burning Out published by Snowbooks: http://www.snowbooks.com/author_May.html. You can see all about Katherine and her books on: http://www.katherinemay.co.uk/, see Katherine reading an extract on Youtube and watch her next book slowly develop by following each day's first and last lines on www.twitter.com/mustardpepper. I haven't read the book yet but I am certain it is going to be well written and a joy to read as Katherine's work always is. I am grateful for the invitation to the event because it spurred me on to make as much use of August as I can while other work is on the back burner.

I met Katherine first through Medway Mermaids the writers' group she set up: http://www.medwaymermaids.btik.com/. I joined because I wanted to move sideways from non fiction academic work to experiment with writing fiction. I felt I wanted the support of other new writers to help me make that shift. With the members I experimented with all sorts of writing: scripts, poetry and historical fiction and learnt a lot especially about 'show' instead of 'tell'. We're always happy to see new members so if you are reading this and looking for support with your writing please make contact.

From the beginning of the snail business I kept a daily journal, partly so I could look back and see what worked and what didn't, as there was a lot of experimenting involved in their care. I've now started re-writing some of the early pieces I wrote, to try and weave it into a coherent shape. It seems to be settling into chunks that correspond with months of the year and events in the East Kent countryside. This, so far amorphous mass of writing, has the provisional title: Of Molluscs and Me, but I don't think I'm ready yet to share it with the wider world. Maybe there will come a time when I want to post extracts up on the net but not yet.

On Sale Here

2009-08-07T03:11:00.000-07:00

The snails will be making an appearance at two events in August this year.

The first event is in Goodnestone Park on Sunday 9th August from 12 till 5 at the Food Fair for the Best of Kent weekend. You will be able to buy hot snails in garlic butter ready to eat and snails to eat at home, bottled in garlic butter or smoked.

for details see: http://www.ct3events.com/Produce--and--Craft-Fayre.php

The second event the snails will be attending is the Annual Barn Produce Show in Littlebourne Barn on Bank Holiday Monday 31 August.

If you haven't been to the historic barn it is definitely worth a visit just to see the inside: http://www.littlebournebarn.co.uk/

The event is an opportunity for local gardeners and allotment holders to show their biggest pumpkins and straightest runner beans. They will also be showing chickens and other livestock, so the snails are appearing under this category. They won't be winning any prizes, but only because the show committee have no criteria by which to judge them. Nevertheless they will be there to smile for the cameras.

Cooking Kentish Snails with Kentish Cider

2009-06-30T00:21:00.000-07:00

Alcohol is an essential ingredient in cooking my locally grown edible snails and here is how to use the local brew Rough Old Wife www.rougholdwife.com/. The flavour will beat anything you've tasted on holiday.

In true Mrs Beaton style: first catch your snails and let them dry off so that they go into temporary aestivation.

Make your cooking stock with the following ingredients:
1oo ml cider
1 litre water
1 crushed clove garlic, chopped shallot, chopped carrot,
sea salt and black pepper
1 clove, 1 bay leaf, small sprinkling of cinnamon and nutmeg,
chopped parsley and thyme (could be dried or fresh)
1 whole bird’s eye chilli (don’t break it up or the stock could be too hot)

(One litre of stock would cook a kilo of snails.)

Make a 10% brine preferably with sea salt

Bring a large pan of water to rapid boil and add salt. Drop the sleeping snails into the boiling water and bring back to the boil for five minutes. Plunge them into cold water after blanching so that you can handle the shells to remove the snail using a fork. Twist the snail with the shape of the shell to remove it.

Drop the de-shelled snails into hot brine and boil for thirty minutes to remove slime.

Rinse well.

Drop snails into the hot stock, bring back to the boil and simmer for about one and a half hours. I use a slow cooker for this part of the process so that I can be sure they will simmer and won’t boil dry. At the end of the cooking process turn off the heat and leave cooked snails in the hot stock while you prepare the garlic butter.

For the garlic butter:
Per 250 gm pack unsalted English butter (taken out of the fridge well ahead of time) which should do 5 or 6 dozen snails, depending on how much you like garlic butter.
20gm chopped garlic
40 gm chopped shallot
Freshly picked parsley – enough to colour it green
Add cider to taste but try 70 ml
The herbs, garlic and shallot are most easily chopped in a food processor with the cider unless you are a skilled chef. Then mix well with the butter.

Drain the snails well and reheat with the cider butter in a hot oven in an oven proof dish until the butter bubbles. Served with crusty bread and a side salad.

Here's looking at you.

2009-06-16T05:26:00.000-07:00

I've written before about Regine Petersen, but just to remind you, she is studying for an MA in Photography at the Royal College of Art in London. A few months ago she took photos of our snails for a project connected with her MA. Now she has entered these wonderful photos of their antennae into the Google photography competition. I hope you agree with me that they look great against the dark background. Here is the link so you can vote:

http://www.google.com/intl/en/landing/photographyprize/vote.html#theme28

Let's see if we can win!

So you want to be a snail farmer

2009-06-14T00:09:00.000-07:00

Let me tell you a story. When we wanted to go into snail farming we spent months fruitlessly searching for information just like you may be doing now. We found some old stuff on the net and looked up the academic texts though they didn’t help much. We also went to visit a man who farms African snails. That was useful because it helped us decide we didn’t want to go down that route. African snails have to be kept warmer than European ones and we were thinking about the cost of heating and the effect on the environment. They do seem to lay eggs more freely and live longer but we didn’t know that then. So one question to ask yourself is: what kind of snails do you want to farm? The answer will be linked to where you are going to put them and where your market will be: who is going to buy them from you and what are they looking for?

In my desperate search for information I kept ringing one snail farmer I found through a tourism website but only got the answer phone. He never returned my calls but around Christmas time I struck lucky and caught him at home. Perhaps he had been indulging in a little Christmas cheer because he was willing to talk and quite encouraging about the proposed venture promising that if we got started he would buy our produce at 4p a snail. Even before we worked out the costs 4p each didn’t sound like very much but I didn’t say so. He spoke at length in general terms but was very vague about the details. He told me he used to offer training for would be snail farmers but wasn’t doing it any more.

Then I found another farmer who was offering a day’s consultancy for £300 and I booked myself onto the course. There was another couple there at the same time and we sat together for a whole day in his grubby sitting room watching a large cockroach crawl up the wall behind his head while he chain smoked. He mentioned casually after a while that he didn’t actually have any snails at that time but didn’t explain why. I've since wondered why I didn't ask the obvious question. He gave us a book apparently recording all the details of the rearing process but it said all sorts of questionable things like: snails get used to being fed at the same time each day. He talked expansively about the opportunities. He generalised a lot when it came to costs which I thought was suspicious at the time but in fact I’ve had trouble pinning down the exact costs too. He said there was room in the market for another 50 farms the same size as his. He also claimed to have sold 32,000 snails in his first month of trading. I have since wondered if this was pure fantasy or just an exaggeration. We certainly should bear in mind that his farm was up for sale and he left the country not long afterwards.

If you want my take on the business then I’ll tell you a few home truths – no exaggerations I promise.

Snail farming is labour intensive. I have seen a mechanised system which washed the snails automatically at intervals but the farmer who bought it said it wasn’t reliable, used a lot of water and was too expensive to run.

Animals never do what they are supposed to do, whether it is growing to the size you want or mating and laying eggs.

You may have to spend a lot of time cooking. When we started we were more interested in looking after the animals than anything else. We assumed our USP (Unique Selling Point)was that we could supply live snails to restaurants: they can buy imported frozen or tinned snails more cheaply but they can’t very easily buy live ones which, for the discerning chef, make a much better quality meal. What we found was that very few chefs have the time or the inclination to deal with live snails if we will take them out of the shells and freeze them for them. We have to sell a proportion direct to the public and, in these days of ready meals, they definitely need to be ready to eat. That all means I spend a lot more time in the kitchen than I really expected. I wondered if I might be able to find a caterer who would do that part for me but so far I haven’t managed to find anyone.

Marketing takes hours and hours and miles of travel and talking persuasively to lots of people … and having to take comments like: ”Oh no! I wouldn’t have anything like that on my menu!”

The restaurant trade is very volatile – most chefs don’t stay in the same place for long, pubs close, restaurants change their buying policy … and that was before the credit crunch!

We’ve had a lot of publicity in local and national press, on TV and radio and it has never brought in a single enquiry resulting in a sale of snails for food. What it does bring in is enquiries from people wanting to set up snail farms.

You are not going to make your fortune from snail farming. All small businesses take time to start making money so you need to be able to support yourself financially until it does and even then you may still need other sources of income to live comfortably. Perhaps you should think of it as part of a portfolio career or one aspect of a mixed farming or other enterprise.

If after all I’ve said, you still want to go ahead with finding out more detail about snail rearing so that you can then decide whether to take it up either as a hobby or a business then I will help you. But in the interests of the viability of my business, I will have to charge you for my knowledge.

May and all those Bank Holiday weekends

2009-05-24T12:01:00.000-07:00

The Times Food Lovers Guide has been in my hand for weeks so I could show the article to everyone I met. It made a good story and the pictures are striking though my friends tell me I don't really look like that: Tom Pilston is a well know documentary photographer. (http://www.tompilston.com/)

Two enquiries came from this publicity: one was a school wanting to keep snails as pets and a couple came from journalists. So I did a recorded interview for Gulf Radio Services that will be broadcast to ex-pats working in the Gulf. They sent me a DVD of the programme which was good. I wonder if any sales will come of it.

I’ve been studying customer behaviour over the holiday weekends. I noticed that snail eaters seem to get up late. Perhaps they’ve been fine dining the night before. All I have to worry about then is the kind of hangover that doesn’t take kindly to the smell of hot garlic butter. I tried persuading a few gardeners that eating snails was a way of getting their own back. These were the early morning shoppers intent on buying food for a cooked meal at midday. My best customers were less focused in their shopping habits. They wandered from shelf to shelf, sniffing the cheese to see if it was ripe, talking about their preparations for the evening to come and discussing the relative merits of different brands of extra virgin olive oil. They tasted the snails with concentration on the task in hand, commented on the texture and flavour, comparing them to those they had tasted on hot holidays in the Dordogne. After due consideration, they took home jars of smoked snails and garlic butter packs to share with friends. Some even phoned their friends to come over and try them.

One tasting took place in the middle of a pet animal show. The market place was full of well groomed obedient dogs greeting each silently with a rear end sniff, in the way dogs do. There was a wire pen full of guinea pigs and rabbits with plenty of warm furry bodies for children to stroke. The café was packed and people wandered round the shop looking at all the delicious goods as though they were a museum collection. Garlic butter scented the air and I watched as the smell raised their noses as they walked through the door to see if it brought a smile of recognition. They were interested in the snail farm as animal lovers might be, fed the cooked snails to their children and wished me luck with the venture.

The best tastings were at Lower Hardres Farm shop off Stone Street and Delf Farm shop at Sandwich where I had to drive back home after the first hour and a half to collect more stock because we had sold out.

My snail canapes in garlic and herb butter also featured on the menu at a well known local restaurant for a chef’s birthday party. So my fingers are crossed that this may bring in results.

The snails are well into egg laying now after an anxious few months in case they didn’t lay. But the shelves are filling with trays of tiny baby snails and most of last Autumn’s crop are ready to cook.

In June we will be at the Godinton Park farm open day on Sunday 7th (http://www.godinton-house-gardens.co.uk/) and the following weekend Friday and Saturday 12th and 13th June we have a stall at the Wealden Times Midsummer Fair at Brick House Farm near Tenterden: (http://www.wealdentimes.co.uk/events/wt86_midsummerfair.asp) Both of these occasions will provide opportunities to taste and buy smoked snails.

I've started offering snail events to primary schools to fit with the National Curriculum Key Stages 1 and 2 so watch this space: http://snailview.blogspot.com/

2009-04-23T13:02:00.000-07:00

April 2009

It’s already April and where did the time go? March blew away in a whirlwind of activity and smiling for the cameras.

Look out for us in the Times Food Lovers Guide and Kent Focus magazine at the end of April. It was Michael Wale who came to meet the snails and find out about the farm for a feature in the Times newspaper. His passion is allotments so he was very much in tune with small scale operations like ours. Read more about him here: (http://www.50connect.co.uk/features_and_regulars/green_issues_with_michael_wale)

We are still recovering from the surprise of being featured on the local news by Meridian and BBC South East and then selected by both channels for their reprise of highlights of the year’s news at Christmas.

The snails were centre stage for the cameras again in March when we were contacted by Regine Petersen a postgraduate student at the Royal College of Art in London. Regine wanted snails to feature in a project for her MA in Photography. (www.reginepetersen.de/) By the time she had spent a week photographing them from every angle she couldn’t bear to part with them and asked if she could keep them as pets.

The new season’s snails are ready for sale and all I have to do now is find buyers. Going round knocking on kitchen doors with snails in my hand has become a familiar activity. Just like last year, there have been many changes since the previous visit: chefs move on, premises change hands or close down. Writing a newsletter proved a useful way to concentrate the mind on what we have to sell. Now that we have permission to sell cooked food to shops and restaurants we can create a wider range of products to try out on old and new customers.

In the beginning our Unique Selling Point was live snails for the discerning chef and we offered frozen uncooked snails for those who preferred them that way. We have now branched out so that we can offer snails cooked simply in court bouillon and either bottled in brine or frozen. The Forager based nearby at Chartham (www.forager.org.uk/) takes orders for live snails and it is a good way for restaurants some distance away to buy just a few. If a chef wants a hundred or more it is worth paying for a carrier and we’ve found APC (East Kent) reliable.

Escargots a la Bourguignon, in presentation shells stuffed with garlic and herb butter, is the familiar way so many holiday makers have tried them. Because these are imported more cheaply than we can produce them we made a decision early on not to go down that route. However, there seems to be a demand so we are producing them this year. The butter is English and the herbs picked freshly for us by Walmestone Growers just a few miles away so they will taste much better of course. (http://www.producedinkent.co.uk/)

Alongside the usual garlic butter version we’ve been developing canapés for dinner parties, adding local cheeses such as Ashmore (www.thecheesemakersofcanterbury.co.uk/.) or local mushrooms. Packaging is one of the biggest challenges because we want them to look irresistible, like chocolates, and that is going to be hard to achieve.

The production of canapés followed on from a very successful day trip to Boulogne at the invitation of Emmanuel Brasseur (www.lescargotiere.com). L'escargotiere du Choquel is just a few miles from Boulogne in the countryside. We learnt such a lot from this one visit and our generous host invited us to go back whenever we want to. The canapés are served in edible shells made of wafer, like ice cream wafer which I have never seen for sale in England. As presentation shells of any kind would have to be imported, we have had to make an exception to our local only rule… but Boulogne is closer than London for us!

Mani’s snails hibernate in the winter unlike ours and had just been woken up to start egg production for the new season. I particularly liked the outside pen, like a big fruit cage, where the youngsters spend most of the summer, protected from predators by a friendly ferret. He does help himself to the occasional snail but more than makes up for such misdemeanours by keeping them safe from everything else. Visiting during the spring lay had great advantages for us because we had a serious problem last year with our adult snails refusing to lay. What do you do when your breeders which should have been full of the joys of Spring stuff themselves full of food then roll over and go back to sleep? Well Mani was able to tell us that the secret is all in the temperature, so this year ours are laying again too.

We launched our new recipe for smoked snails at Hadlow lambing event In March where they were voted delicious. Last year we had a lot of support from local food smokers such as Parkside Trout Farm but now that we have total control of the process we’ve been able to cure the cooked snails with sea salt and brown sugar which enhances the flavour considerably and adds to the shelf life. The recipe we are using is supposed to preserve them for a whole year but it will be a long time before we can print that claim on the label.

Over the next few weeks you can taste the produce at some of our local outlets Macknade’s, (www.macknade.com/events.html) on 25 April and
Kent Farm Gate Foods at Lower Hardres Farm shop on 2 May. Other new customers include Mamafeelgoods, www.mamafeelgoods.co.uk/ at Bekesbourne, Delf Farm shop (www.discoversandwich.co.uk/shops.htm ) at Sandwich and Perry Court Farm shop on the outskirts of Ashford

Wheelers Oyster Bar will be stocking local snails again this summer from May bank holiday weekend onwards, we’re very pleased to report. Mark and Delia have been very supportive of our business since we first started selling about eighteen months ago now.
(www.whitstable-shellfish.co.uk/wheelers.html) and from time to time they will be on the menu at the restaurant at the Goods Shed and the award winning Mulberry Tree at Boughton Monchelsea. So it’s back to the kitchen!

Snail farming in rural East Kent

2008-11-09T08:43:00.001-08:00

Helix aspersa maxima

We are a small local food producer based in East Kent and members of Produced in Kent (www.producedinkent.co.uk). We have been farming edible snails on a small scale for two years but have just started to expand.

November began with the Tenterden and Cranbrook Food Festival which would have been a complete washout from the snail point of view if it hadn’t been for meeting Oliver Rowe, Urban Chef of TV fame. But I also met Zoe Meyer who runs a publishing consultancy (see: mailto:zoe@zoesbooks.co.uk) and advised me to start writing a blog so here I am.

We had Meridian filming here on Monday 3rd and the snails and I featured on the ITV south east local news that same evening. They also filmed at The Dog Inn, Wingham (www.thedoginn.co.uk/) where snails have been on the menu for more than a year now.

On Tuesday evening I went to the launch of Sue Pope’s book – Lighter than Air (see: http://www.susan-pope.co.uk/). It was quite an event and it was good to meet up with old friends from my writer’s group Medway Mermaids (www.medwaymermaids.btik.com).

On Wednesday I visited four pubs I have sold snails to in the past and had one of those all too familiar experiences. At the first pub it was good to talk to the sous chef but I have to go back next week to meet the head chef who seems to have changed since I was there three weeks ago. At the second pub I was assured they are interested in serving snails but not yet so I should go back at the beginning of December. At the third pub the owner was on holiday but the chef said they have a French evening planned next week so they might want snails. I need to go back next week when the owner is back. At the fourth pub where I had sold some snails a month ago I called in to find out how the chef had got on with cooking and serving them. But I found the place had completely changed hands – new owner, new chef and new bar staff so no one had any recollection of what had gone before. If they look in the freezer they might find a bag of snails. The new chef is not there on Wednesdays so I need to go back.

Roman snail: empty shells

Thursday was my first experience of meeting Roman snails. I found my way to the secret location along narrow winding streets past a Roman villa. Roman snails are protected now so it is illegal to collect them. Martin Willing the Conservation Officer of the Conchological Society (http://www.conchsoc.org/) was very helpful in providing information about them. The Romans are thought to be the first people to farm snails in 50 BC and when they invaded Britain they brought some with them. They are found now in isolated pockets mainly in association with sites of former Roman occupation. The snails themselves are almost white, both bodies and shells. At this site they seemed to be living under a canopy of trees where the ground was spongy with dead leaves over the chalky soil.

When I got home there was an email from a French farmer located near Boulogne inviting me to visit so that we can talk about the different way we raise and cook snails. I was delighted with the invitation and wondered how he had found me. Boulogne is just a day trip away on the ferry so I will definitely go.

The week ended by collecting some lovely little hand thrown pots from Aylesford Pottery. (www.aylesfordpottery.co.uk/). I asked them to make me some pots for serving snails as an alternative to presentation shells which have to be imported. So now I have ten sets of 6 pots and a dish for sale at £17.50 plus postage or they could be hired for events.