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Did You See That Escargot?
Food trends appear and disappear as quickly as freshly baked chocolate pecan cookies. It becomes well nigh impossible to keep up, or keep track, of them all. But after a decade or so dishes or foods from our past find their way back again as “new”, the hottest trend. It seems that the ancient adage “There is nothing on earth that’s new under the sun” or more to the modern ear “Everything old is new again”. Which brings me to L’escargots, or snails.
Snails have been around for a long, long time, millions of years in fact. And subsequently, in that time, humans evolved and when they discovered the snail to be edible a beautiful on again off again relationship was born. It didn’t take too long, with the advent of fire, to conclude that when a stray snail found its way into the fire, sizzled and popped with roasting meat fat dripping on it, that it tasted much better that when it didn’t. Especially with a bit of wild garlic added to it. This discovery was the new Eden. Proof of Darwin’s Theory of Evolution from an amoeba, to ape to bi-pedal gastronome is incontrovertible when viewed from the epicurean’s theory of evolution.
We know that snails were held in high regard as a gourmet dish from the written accounts by the ancient Greeks and Romans. These written depictions of sublime feasts waxed rhapsodic especially about rare tidbits prepared in decadent lavish ways to intrigue and excite jaded palates – in fact, Epicurus comes to mind. Snails were prepared in such ways even to the extent of being gilded with gold leaf, and strung with larks tongues on silk to become an edible necklace. One can only guess where a person dipped the bread to get at the garlic butter (olive oil).
After the fall of the Roman Empire and the ensuing chaos, dining on snails became more of a peasant dish, or not the least, a dish that the lords and peasants alike could eat though with marked difference in seasoning and setting. Still, garlic was common enough, as was fat in the forms of oils, butter, or rendered fat. Add to that wild or cultivated herbs and rustic bread – Lo! Heaven on earth again.
And so it went on century after century as feudal fiefdoms rose into Kingdoms, and Kingdoms into Countries, the consumption of snails kept pace with political appetites of the times. After a war (and there were a lot of wars) there generally wasn’t much left to eat for those that survived; so how convenient and deliciously practical, one could always find snails swanning about devastated croplands and ruined market gardens, feeding themselves into a gluttonous insensibility ready for the picking and consuming; or they might seem wily and too quick to catch if one had starved for too long. They are filled with nutrients and are a reasonable source of protein (Snails not the war refugees who were probably emaciated) combined with some leftover garlic and herbs growing in an obscure place that was not trampled or bombarded. Add a little stolen oil or rancid fat, and one can almost overlook the horror particularly if one has managed to snag a piece of moldy crust to dip in the garlic oil.
For the most part snails remain a common food staple for indigenous peoples over most of the world. In North America, today, we are familiar with the snail from the influence of the French restaurant, or any eatery with a bistro pretension. The escargot craze was big during the 1960’s when dinning out became more acceptable and French cooking began to enter the household repertoire via television cooking shows – Julia Child for instance. Fondues, Quiches, chocolate mousse, anything with ‘a la’ after it, were all the rage. Snails or Escargots were more fanciful and it was considered to be very sophisticated and worldly, truly gourmet hence became de rigueur if you dined out. Image is everything when climbing the social ladder and snails elevated many a parvenu. When the escargot had become once more so common place it fell out of favor, around the beginning of the 1980’s, and with tastes changing to the no fat or low fat (real butter et al) cuisines minceur and nouvelle, the poor but distinguished snail slowly crawled away and back into its shell and disappeared from menus everywhere. Snail tongs, forks and trays piled up in stacks and heaps, gathering dust in basements storage rooms, next to fondue sets! Alas, the ignominity!
During the late 80’s and early 90’s a small movement developed in Italy – The Slow Food Society. They started the movement to return to local cuisines and ingredients, traditional cooking and food preparation methods. Regional cuisines and ingredients of countries became the “new” trend and with all this return to traditional foods came the snail. Once again it came back into food fashion – more so because the symbol of the International Slow Food Movement/Society is … you guessed it; the snail.
All of this investigation and searching of a country’s regional cooking has uncovered and brought to light (or to the table) hundreds of snail recipes which one can collect from their travels abroad, or down load from the internet.
But regardless of the myriad ways to prepare snails there is always one common denominator for all of them bar none – some fat and a bit of garlic. And it all began with our first ancestor, whether it was an ape or Adam, an outstretched arm with index finger pointing, spoke these words “Hey Eve (or fill in the blank), did you see that escargot!”
… And thus began the ascent of Man.