Eating Escargot in Paris

One of my favourite things about travel is trying new food and experiencing local cuisines. When I travel to a new country I try very hard to eat only the local cuisine while I’m there, which I usually find is delicious. In some places around the world, however, the local cuisine does come with some less desirable delicacies that I shy away from (e.g. scorpions in Thailand).

In Paris, I already knew that I liked the cuisine (French food is amazing), but one dish I wasn’t overly keen on trying was one of its most famous delicacies – escargot. My argument was, why would I want to eat a slimy snail when there is all of this other amazing food available? But you all told me that I had to try it, and so at a little restaurant in the Saint Michel district of Paris, I sat down and ordered my first entree of escargot.

The dish came out on a small plate with six snails still in their shells. A green coloured sauce filled the opening to the shell with the slug very visible beneath it. The waiter showed me how to attack the dish by holding the shell with the special “escargot instrument” (basically a specially designed set of tongs) and scooping the snail out with a tiny fork.

The aroma from the dish was rather nice – buttery with herbs and garlic – but it didn’t look appetising at all.

I grabbed my first snail, which slipped out of my tongs three times before I was able to secure it properly. Gripping it firmly, I scooped out the little snail covered in green sauce and shoved it in my mouth, half expecting to spit it straight back out.

Well, you were all absolutely right – it was delicious. I haven’t had anything like it before in my life, but I thoroughly enjoyed the dish and not a single snail was spared. Oh yes, I will be ordering escargot again.

Have you tried escargot? Share your experience in the comments below.