The Happy Home Cook: Two Ways of Cooking Kuhol (Snails)

The Happy Home Cook features cherished recipes of Filipino dishes from well-known foodies and contributors. If you have a recipe that you are proud of and would like to share, please send it along with a photo of the dish, your two-sentence bio and your picture to submissions@positivelyfilipino.com.

Inukit from Café Tam Tam (Photo by Rene Astudillo)

Inukit

By Harry Osboken of Cafe Tam Tam

Ingredients

-100 grams of kuhol meat

-1 medium onion, sliced

-2 tsps., soy sauce

-Salt and pepper to taste

-2 tbsps., cooking oil

-1 slice of lemon

Procedure

-Soak the fresh kuhol in water for 1-2 days to rid of impurities

-Boil the kuhol with tanglad or charcoal (for about 25 minutes)

-Shuck the meat using any sharp or stick-like object

-Heat oil in a pan

-Add onions and cook until fragrant

-Add the kuhol meat

-Add soy sauce

-Add salt and pepper to taste

-Continue to cook for about 2-3 minutes

-Transfer kuhol to a plate and sprinkle with the juice of a lemon

Ginataang Kuhol

By Rene Astudillo from My Bay Kitchen
https://mybaykitchen.wordpress.com/2016/02/11/ginataang-kuhol-escargot-in-coconut-milk/

Ginataang Kuhol (Photo by Rene Astudillo)

Since that “to die for” moment in 2008 eating baked escargot at a Paris family-owned restaurant, the thought of preparing this delectable appetizer at home on a regular basis has not escaped my mind. Living in California, it has been a challenge finding edible snails in supermarkets or grocery stores.

Now that I’m back in my hometown of Baguio City, a short trip to the city’s public market would get me unlimited quantities of live snails. Vendors don’t always display the snails in the open; you have to ask for them.

Who needs to go to a French restaurant for a small plate of expensive escargot, when I can have a dozen of it at my beck and call, for a fraction of the price?

Ingredients

1 lb edible snails

1 can (14 oz) coconut milk

1 thumb ginger, peeled and julienned

1 medium white onion, sliced

1 head garlic, peeled and crushed

3 red Thai chillies

Salt and pepper to taste

Sliced green onions for garnish

2 tbsps Olive oil

Procedure

Soak live snails in water for 2-3 hours, constantly draining and change the water.  Using the side of a kitchen knife, tap on the pointed edge of the snails until it breaks.  Wash the snails until you rid of all small shell debris. Drain and set aside.

Heat Olive oil on a large pan. Add garlic and ginger and cook until fragrant.  Add in onions and chillies and continue cooking for about two minutes.  Add in the snails and cook over high heat.  The snails will render water.  Continue to cook until most of the water has evaporated.  Add in the coconut milk and continue to cook over medium heat, uncovered, until almost dry.

Remove from heat and garnish with green onions before serving.

---

Rene Astudillo is a writer, book author and blogger and has recently retired from more than two decades of nonprofit community work in the Bay Area. He spends his time between California and the Philippines.

---

More articles from Rene Astudillo