Whelks with Escargot Butter

Name: Whelks with Escargot Butter
Yield: Serves 4
Ingredients: 1 pound (455 g) salted butter, at room temperature; 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped (or more if desired); About 1/2 cup (15 g) chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley; 3 tablespoons bread crumbs; 1/4 cup (50 g) almond powder; 1/4 cup (60 ml) pastis; 1 teaspoon salt; 1/2 teaspoon pepper; 4 drops of Tabasco sauce; 16 whelks, handpicked and individually smelled to make sure they are fresh (discard any that don’t smell like food); 12 cups (3 liters) water; 1/2 cup (115 g) salt

January 24, 2012

Whelks are giant marine snails. In towns along the Saint Lawrence (like Kamouraska), you can find them in gallon jars, marinated in brine or white vinegar. At Joe Beef, we buy whelks fresh from La Mer, Montreal’s big seafood broker, and serve them with escargot butter. In Burgundy, chefs are judged by their snail butter. Literally. You can work under three different Michelin-starred chefs and they’ll all tell you that there is only one way to make escargot butter—and each way will be completely different. This classic recipe is the escargot butter that drowned Montreal after Expo 67 (see page 52). If you’re not a whelk fan, you can enjoy the butter slipped under the skin of a chicken before it is roasted, on a steak, over mashed potatoes, or just spread on toast.

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