Probe under operculum

Follow the natural curve

Draw it all out

A done deed

Periwinkles are something you eat for the fun of it while conversing with friends or reading a good cook book. You'll pretty much starve if you depend on the for significant nutrition - there's really not a lot in there. While preparing this article I ate 151 of them and it was not filling.

It may look like way too much trouble to eat them at first, but with just a bit of practice you'll be zipping the little critters out of their shells without even thinking about it.

It's best to buy your periwinkles from a reliable source with plenty of turn-over to assure a minimum of dead ones. Usually this will be an Asian market with circulating water tanks.

1. determine if your periwinkles are alive or dead. If you let them rest for awhile they will relax slightly and you'll be able to tell if they respond to a poke on the operculum (the door that closes the shell). If they try to crawl away they're definitely alive. Discard dead ones.
2. Wash the snails thoroughly in cold running water. You can use a light cleaning solution if you wish, the snails will pull back into their shells and close the door.
3. Prepare a light sauce, maybe a lemon butter sauce with white wine. Dipping these tiny critters individually in a sauce is quite a hassle so you probably want to just cook them in the sauce.
4. Bring the sauce to a boil and pour in the snails. Bring it back to a boil and simmer from 3 to five minutes.
5. Strain the snails out onto a plate or shallow bowl. Pick them up individually and pry them out of their shells as shown in the photos. You'll quickly get a hang of how to get under the operculum and draw them out against the natural curve of their shell.
6. The last photo shows a disassembled periwinkle. The spiral part is the digestive organs and other gookies which you'll probably want to discard. The black and white part to the right is the part you eat. Remember to remove the operculum (the little disk to the upper right) before eating.