SNAIL MALES AND FEMALES

A little while back I was at Milsoms, an interesting restaurant in Dedham, to celebrate my pal Nicola’s birthday. I saw snails on the menu as starter so immediately ordered them.  They came looking like this.

 

My own bad phone picture.

They were fine but a bit sweet and sticky.  I hadn’t read the menu in any detail so only later did I realized they were ‘Garlic snails on toasted sourdough, madeira & thyme sauce with parsley mayonnaise.’  And yes, that's a kind of potato waffle type thing perched on top. 

Three issues arose: one that I’m not very fond of madeira, two that it was a very long time since I’d last had snails – didn’t you used to see them on sale in any decent deli?  And three, my pal Penny who was also at the dinner said she thought snails were just a delivery system for garlic, butter and lemon.’ And you know I think she was absolutely right.

 

So I decided to have my own snail adventure.  First, I happened to know that the local antiques emporium had snail plates for sale.  They had a few different options and they’d been there a while, which was further evidence that eating snails may have gone off trend. I went for these metal numbers:

And then I bought a can of Burgundy snails (Helix Pomatia).  I had to go online - I didn’t know where else to get them.  And they were much more expensive than I was expecting – about 12 quid.

In a better world I would have bought shells as well, but that would have added another tenner to the price, making it a very expensive starter.  And yes we did use them as a delivery system for lemon, butter and garlic. Also parsley.  

Photo by Caroline Gannon.

I wish I could say that mighty bunch of parsley came from my own garden but it actually came from the farmer’s market, and cost less than a pound.  ‘You don’t get that in Sainsbury’s,’ the woman on the stall said, and how right she was.

 

And so it all went well.  Lemon, butter, garlic and parsley were all duly delivered. We ate them with untoasted slices of baguette which was fine – don’t overcomplicate things!

 

I’ll be trying again soon.  Now, I ask myself, am I spearheading a snail revival?  It seems unlikely.  However, according to Alan Davidson in the Oxford Companion to Food, a taste for snails has regularly come and gone throughout history.  The Mesopotamians ate them, the Romans domesticated them and bred them in vivaria, but there seem to have been centuries when few people ate them at all. Of course in Britain we associate snails with the French which means that many British folk have felt obligated to hate them.  Davidson writing, in 1999 or so, says he hopes such attitudes have gone never to return. He was an optimist.

INSOUCIANCE WITH EVERYTHING

 In London again, and first of all, lunch at the Seven Stars pub, in Carey Street out by the Inns of Court. There’s some evidence that this is London’s oldest pub.  The place is run by the somewhat legendary Roxy Beaujolais. This is how she looks on the pub’s website.

 

I had the cheese and onion pie which in ordinary circumstances would have been way too sweet for my tastes but the dressing on that salad was so wonderfully tart and sour, it was just great.

 

The external window displays are another attraction, seen below in my own poor photographs. The first one is a replica of Marcel Marien’s ‘L’Introuvable,’ a one lensed spectacle, or I suppose monocle.

and the other is simply labeled Cabinet of Jurisprudence.  Yep, something’s dead in there:

 

Who doesn’t like a Surrealist display and a bit of ironic taxidermy with their lunch?  Better pictures are no doubt available, or you could just go there and see for yourself.

 

Then the next day St John, so reliable, without being predictable.  Among other things we went with the oak leaf and snails, yes there are snails in there:

Photo by Caroline Gannon.

 

 and then sweetbreads with mint.

 

Photo by Caroline Gannon.

Ya know, sweetbreads were one of the first things I ever cooked for myself when I was becoming a foodie.  I used to work round the corner from Selfridges and there they were on display, so I bought and cooked them – somehow it seemed less daunting than cooking, say, a steak.  

 

Our St John waiter was perfectly good if a little more insouciant and lugubrious than you normally get there. I saw on the drinks menu something called Gin and French and I asked, ‘Is that like a dry martini?’ and our man said, ‘Well, it’s more like a wet martini,’ which didn’t explain anything.

 

Photo by Caroline Gannon.

We ordered two.  They were fine, but I wasn’t sure what I’d actually drunk till I got home and looked it up in The Book of St John p 265 – it’s equal parts gin and vermouth, and obviously served on the rocks. It wasn’t as good as a real St John martini but it was about half the price, so that was something, if not everything.