Monday 26 July 2021

Heavy weather

Today the weather is very heavy and I am finding it difficult to move around and make much effort to do anything.   Luckily I had two bills to pay - one to L for buying my salad things in our little town and the other to her husband who does my milk round, so I forced myself to write out two cheques and walk down the road nice and early to post them through the letter box -  this is on my usual route.   I was back home before it got really hot.   Switching on the television I found when I returned that we had already won two Gold Medals - One to Adam Peaty in the Breast Stroke and one to Tom Daly and his partner in the High Diving.  What a good start to the day.

I followed that with a decision to go the hospital next week by taxi to avoid close contact with a lot of people.   I have made the reservation and can forget that too now. 

The Chiropodist came at lunch time to give my feet a treat and the Lifeline Lady came shortly afterwards to check that my Lifeline button was in working order (she calls once each month).   Lunch over I began to put on a Post but the weather is so very hot and close that I just couldn't summon up the effort to do it, so decided to wait until it was a bit cooler.   No rain here at all yet but a photograph on the front of today's Times shows water welly-high in St James's Park in London.

The snail has not moved far - I can find no reference to anything remotely like it on line - at this rate I shall never find out what it is exactly.

I now have a fridge full of salad things - tomatoes, Romaine lettuce, beetroot, olives, quiche - and an unstarted cucumber on the worktop - all I need is to summon up the energy to amalgamate the lot into a salad tea - the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. 

And speaking of flesh - the article I read on snails on line  said that all British snails are edible. Well I adore mussels and all shellfish - and I don't suppose that snails are any different really - but could I eat one?   Definitely not.   Cro, if you read this I dare say you are partial to a snail or two but sorry to say they are definitely off menu for me.   What about you?   Has anyone out there ever eaten a British snail?   Sophisticated Frenchies don't count - I am speaking here of a good old rustic British snail you might meet half way up a lettuce leaf.

23 comments:

the veg artist said...

I would have to be on a desert island, on the point of starvation, with nothing else edible at all before I would even think about eating a snail, of any nationality.So a 'NO' from me!

CharlotteP said...

It takes a surprising amount of effort to put together a good salad...definitely worth it though!
The snail can probably feel your vibes...'Can you eat snails?'...'Not Me', says he! Probably too hot and dry, too!

Derek Faulkner said...

It has been very muggy/humid down here today, with sun this evening. Really tiring and makes my joints ache - oh for some hot and sunny weather again. Still can't believe that we missed the torrential rain that London and West Kent got yesterday - but glad we did, that was too heavy.
A very common snail round here is the Yellow-lipped snail, have a look at that.
I adore shellfish of all types but no way could I eat snails - strange isn't it.

gz said...

And add Tom Pidcock winning gold in the MTB...and a silver for Yee in the Triathlon.
Odd weather here too..fog to start with, then the sun out but a bit heavy and moist.
Thankfully everything lifted enough to dry the washing!

Rachel Phillips said...

It is just an English snail in the garden. I have eaten snails in France and loved them.

The Weaver of Grass said...

If I were to go to France again - which I will not be doing - I might be tempted to try a snail I think. (easy to say when I am not going)

Virginia said...

That snail might move back into view if you took him up a drink of water!
I enjoy snails, but I’ve not cooked them at home. We have a couple of French cafes/restaurants that have them on the menu and I treat myself to a lunch dish every so often. Well cooked, they’re close to the texture of a field mushroom, and taste mostly of the garlic butter. Overcooked they’re chewy, stringy rubber!

Who’s eaten frog’s legs? Now that’s a bite too far for me!

I hope you get some relief from the heat soon, it sounds oppressive.

Heather said...

I don't fancy eating snails, but if they were prepared and cooked by someone who knew what they were doing it might be different.
Yesterday was beautifully cool down here and I managed to do quite a lot. Warmer today but still not as bad as last week. I have lived on salads for days and had to cook quite a lot of unused veggies to prevent them from going to waste. I roasted them, cooled them and then froze them.
Who knows what tomorrow might bring.

Jules said...

It's been much warmer than I expected today. X

Minigranny said...

I've had snails but could take them or leave them. It's low pressure at the moment and can feel it in my arthitic hip. Roll on my op in November!

The Weaver of Grass said...

Virginia I have indeed found the heat oppressive today.

Thanks to you all for your contributions.

Marcia LaRue said...

I have had escargot after a cocktail or 2 and thought they were quite good!
I have also had deep fried frog legs and loved them!
Hot in Colorado, too!

Bonnie said...

I saw Adam Peaty win the gold in the Breast Stroke and enjoyed the competition very much. I would not be able to eat a snail even though I hear it is a delicacy when properly prepared.

Virginia asked, "Who’s eaten frog’s legs?". My Dad grew up on a farm in southern Arkansas, and would often talk about eating frog legs when he was growing up. When I was a child he loved to tell me the story about how the frog legs would jump around in the pan as they were being cooked! Of course, they didn't actually hop around, but because of a nerve in the legs they did appear to jump. Personally, I could never eat them. My Dad grew up in a family of 12 children and on the farm they enjoyed a wide variety of food!

Debby said...

The nice thing about a salad is that you can assemble a big salad (leaving off the tomatoes) and divide it into two bowls to have another salad, with no additional effort the next day!

Heat and humidity are not a pleasant combination.

I've never eaten snails, but I'm not against trying them. I had frog legs in a Chinese restaurant. They weren't awful, but they were not something I'll ever get a craving for, I don't imagine.

Sarah Head said...

I've eaten snails in France - a little chewy but ok. I believe you have to keep them on a diet of fresh lettuce or something similar to clean out their digestive tracts for up to four days before eating them. I would imagine most of the actual flavour comes from the garlic and herb sauce since the texture is very rubbery. A case of ordinary peasant food eaten across Europe now "elevated" to gourmet class because we've forgotten how to do it for ourselves.

I've not eaten frogs legs, but did dissect a frog as part of my biology "A" level. Fascinating stuff with nerves. I've been researching the preponderance of Frog wells across the UK, which seemed strange given that there's no memory of eating them this side of the channel. Once I looked up John Hall's treatments (the leading English apothecary and Shakespeare's son in law and doctor) and combined that with some local Gloucestershire folk law, it all began to make sense. Frogs were an important medicinal resource and wells where they congregated were marked in every village. Frogs were cool and damp and easily digestible so were commonly prescribed for patients with hot, chesty diseases such as TB and typhoid. Frog spawn was collected and dried onto sheets to use against nose bleeds. The sound a frog makes resembles a cough, hence the expression "A frog in the throat" which some country folk took a step further in treating lung diseases in large animals by literally stuffing a frog down their throat. Then of course, during Charles II's time, when syphilis was rife, frog skin was used to hide nasty sores on the nether regions of sufferers (practically all the gentry!).

Apologies for the long post, but I find it fascinating.

Joanne Noragon said...

My granddaughter told me about trying "a snail" in New Orleans. "I didn't chew it, I just swallowed it" she declared.

Margaret Butterworth said...

My brother-in-law used to catch snails in his garden in Yorkshire. He put them in a bucket of flour, which they ate to get cleaned out. He had enjoyed snails in a restaurant in Majorca and wanted to "try them at home".
Re identification: there is an app called iNaturalist that allows you to upload a photo of any flora and fauna, make a guess what it is and then somebody will provide a proper identification.

Cro Magnon said...

I had a big plate of Snails last Thursday; they were delicious. Still no rain here; promises, promises. They now forecast a good storm for Friday.

Hilde said...

Most of the frog´s legs are imported from Indonesia. They tear out the legs and leave the frogs to die. Most of the frogs are caught in the fields where they are important for the harvest because they eat slugs and insects. So no, I would not eat frog´s legs.
Hilde in Germany

Librarian said...

Snails and frog legs - when my sister and I were little, my family spent almost all our holidays in France (we lived close to the border then). My parents's friends there in the village were keen cooks and prided themselves of collecting and harvesting much of what they used in their kitchen - herbs, mushrooms, berries, and also snails and frogs. My parents told my sister and I that it would be very rude not to at least try what they served us, and so we did. Fried frog legs tasted like chicken, and the snails? I can not remember their own taste, because they were covered in delicious garlic butter and eaten with freshly baked baguette.

It's been very unsettled here yesterday weather-wise, with a beautiful rainbow in the evening.

The Weaver of Grass said...

Hilde - this is not widely known and should definitely be known - absolutely terrible. They are not widely eaten in the UK apart from maybe in some restaurants in cities.

Cro - I knew you would come up trumps where snails were concerned.
Thanks Margaret - I will try that
Sarah - Fascinating stuff indeed - thank you for the information.
Thanks for your information Bonnie - my first husband was one of twelve - he certainly didn't grow up to be picky with his food. He ate what was put in front of him.

Thank you everyone. What fascinating stuff you all write.

Ellen D. said...

I don't think I would eat a snail either! We did have frog legs once years ago when I was a kid and I remember them tasting like fried chicken wings.
When I was in China for my son's wedding, there were several dishes I just couldn't try because they had eyes looking at me - whole fish, crabs, turtle. I was squeamish about the food.

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