Lemongrass snails with spicy soy sauce

Recipe Category : Vietnamese

  Ingredients :

• 2 fresh lemongrass stalks
• ½ lb ground pork
• 7 oz can large Burgundy snails, drained, rinsed, minced
• 2 tspn finely grated fresh ginger
• 2 Thai chilies, halved and seeded, 1 minced, 1 julienne
• 1 tspn sesame oil
• ¾ tspn kosher salt
• ½ tspn freshly ground pepper
• 24 snail shells
• lettuce or cabbage leaves, for steaming
• ¼ cup vegetable oil
• 1 scallion, white and light green parts only, thinly sliced on the diagonal
• ¼ cup soy sauce

Preparation and Cooking Instructions

1. Trim the root ends of the lemongrass and remove a total of 8 long outer leaves from the stalks. Tear the leaves into three 3" strands. Trim off and discard all but the bottom 3" of the stalks and finely chop one of the tender bulbs. Thinly slice the remaining bulb on the diagonal. In a mini processor, puree the chopped lemongrass to a fine paste.
2. In a bowl, combine the ground pork with the snails, ginger, minced chili, sesame oil, salt, pepper and lemongrass paste.
3. Gently bend a lemongrass strand in half and stick it inside a snail shell, bent side in, and with the two ends protruding. Stuff the shell with 2 tspn of the pork-and-snail filling, working it between the lemongrass ends. Wipe the rim of the shell. Repeat with the remaining lemongrass strands, shells and filling.
4. Line a steamer rack with lettuce leaves and set the stuffed shells on top. Steam the snails until hot to the touch and cooked through, about 8 minutes.
5. Meanwhile, heat the oil in a small saucepan. Add the sliced lemongrass, julienne chili and scallion and cook over moderate heat until fragrant, about 1 minute. Pour the soy sauce into a heatproof serving bowl. Stir in the scallion-and-chili oil and serve with the snails.
6. Notes for the cook : Live snails are traditionally used in this Vietnamese recipe, but I find that canned snails work very well. The snails are chopped and mixed with pork, chili, ginger and other flavorings, then stuffed into snail shells and steamed. The two snail species most commonly eaten are the Burgundy, or vineyard snail (which has a yellowish brown shell with spiral stripes) and the petit-gris, or garden snail (which is slightly smaller and has a yellowish gray shell with purplish brown stripes). Because Burgundy snails are plumper and tastier, they are the first choice for this dish.