M S Lovell, The Edible Molluscks of Great Britain and Ireland with Recipes for Cooking Them, 1867.
M S Lovell, The Edible Molluscks of Great Britain and Ireland with Recipes for Cooking Them, 1867.
Originally published in 1867, this unusual book contains a slug of information on how edible land and sea snails can be prepared for the table. Lovell points out that while sea snails were the favoured source of mollusck meat, terrestrial snails proved to be an invaluable source of food for the inhabitants of central France during the famine of 1816-17. This is perhaps how snails came to be such a prominent protein in French gastronomy.
The Edible Molluscks of Great Britain and Ireland with Recipes for Cooking Them [Google books]