''Ginataang kuhol'' is a

Filipino Filipino may refer to: * Something from or related to the Philippines ** Filipino language, standardized variety of 'Tagalog', the national language and one of the official languages of the Philippines. ** Filipinos, people who are citizens of th ...

snail A snail is, in loose terms, a shelled gastropod. The name is most often applied to land snails, terrestrial pulmonate gastropod molluscs. However, the common name ''snail'' is also used for most of the members of the molluscan class G ...

stew made from

apple snail Ampullariidae, commonly known as the apple snails, is a family of large freshwater snails, aquatic gastropod mollusks with a gill and an operculum. These snails simultaneously have a gill and a lung as functional respiratory structures, wh ...

s in coconut milk with

leafy vegetables Leaf vegetables, also called leafy greens, pot herbs, vegetable greens, or simply greens, are plant leaves eaten as a vegetable, sometimes accompanied by tender petioles and shoots. Leaf vegetables eaten raw in a salad can be called salad gr ...

onion An onion (''Allium cepa'' L., from Latin ''cepa'' meaning "onion"), also known as the bulb onion or common onion, is a vegetable that is the most widely cultivated species of the genus ''Allium''. The shallot is a botanical variety of the onio ...

, garlic, ginger (or

turmeric Turmeric () is a flowering plant, ''Curcuma longa'' (), of the ginger family, Zingiberaceae, the rhizomes of which are used in cooking. The plant is a perennial, rhizomatous, herbaceous plant native to the Indian subcontinent and Southeast ...

), ''

siling haba ''Siling haba'' ("long chili"), ''espada'' ("sword" in Spanish), ''siling mahaba'', ''siling pangsigang'' ("chili for ''sinigang''"), ''siling Tagalog'' ("Tagalog chili"), and sometimes called green chili, finger chili or long pepper, is one of ...

'' chilis, ''

bagoong alamang Shrimp paste or prawn sauce is a fermented condiment commonly used in Southeast Asian and Southern Chinese cuisines. It is primarily made from finely crushed shrimp or krill mixed with salt, and then fermented for several weeks. They are eith ...

'' (shrimp paste), and salt and pepper. ''

Labuyo ''Siling labuyo'' is a small chili pepper cultivar that developed in the Philippines after the Columbian Exchange. It belongs to the species ''Capsicum frutescens'' and is characterized by triangular fruits which grow pointing upwards. The fru ...

'' chilis are also commonly added for a spicier version. The leafy vegetables can include

water spinach ''Ipomoea aquatica'', widely known as water spinach, is a semi- aquatic, tropical plant grown as a vegetable for its tender shoots. ''I. aquatica'' is generally believed to have been first domesticated in Southeast Asia. It is widely cultivate ...

, moringa leaves, and

chili pepper Chili peppers (also chile, chile pepper, chilli pepper, or chilli), from Nahuatl '' chīlli'' (), are varieties of the berry-fruit of plants from the genus ''Capsicum'', which are members of the nightshade family Solanaceae, cultivated for ...

leaves, among others.

Background

The dish was originally used for members of the

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

'' Pila'', which are the native

species found in the Philippine islands. These are known as ''kuhol'' (also ''kohol'' or ''cohol'') in most parts of the Philippines, and ''bisokol'' (or ''bisocol'') in northeastern

Luzon Luzon (; ) is the largest and most populous island in the Philippines. Located in the northern portion of the Philippines archipelago, it is the economic and political center of the nation, being home to the country's capital city, Manila, as ...

. However, it is now more commonly used for the highly invasive

golden apple snail ''Pomacea canaliculata'', commonly known as the golden apple snail or the channeled apple snail, is a species of large freshwater snail with gills and an operculum, an aquatic gastropod mollusc in the family Ampullariidae, the apple snails ...

s (''Pomacea canaliculata''), also called ''kuhol'', which are originally from

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sout ...

and considered to be in the top 100 of the "World's Worst Invasive Alien Species". Golden apple snails originally entered the Philippines from 1982 to 1984 from farmed specimens in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

. They were originally meant to be used as food for humans and

domestic duck The domestic duck or domestic mallard (''Anas platyrhynchos domesticus'') is a subspecies of mallard that has been domesticated by humans and raised for meat, eggs, and down feathers. A few are also kept for show, as pets, or for their ornament ...

s, but they escaped into the wild. They have become a major pest in

rice field Wendel D. Ley Track and Holloway Field is a stadium in Houston, Texas. It is primarily used for track and field and soccer for the Rice University Owls. It is bounded by Main Street (southeast), University Boulevard (southwest), Reckling Pa ...

s in the Philippines as well as in other Asian countries.

Description

Before cooking, the apple snails need to be cleaned thoroughly to remove the dirt and slime. This is done by soaking them overnight or for a few hours, which induces them to regurgitate digested matter. Cornstarch or flour may be added to the water to aid this process. They are rinsed thoroughly and the shells cleaned. The source of the snails are also important. They have to be from clean bodies of water, which can sometimes be difficult to ascertain. Commercially farmed canned versions can also be bought as an alternative. The apple snails can be cooked in the shell or without them. If the shells are retained, the end tips are snipped off to facilitate cooking and to loosen the meat inside. The dish is cooked by sautéing the garlic, onions, and ginger (or turmeric) until translucent and fragrant. The snails are added and sautéed for a minute before thin coconut milk and the rest of the spices are added. It is simmered in low heat for around ten minutes. The leafy vegetables are added last and (optionally) thicker

coconut cream Coconut milk is an opaque, milky-white liquid extracted from the grated pulp of mature coconuts. The opacity and rich taste of coconut milk are due to its high oil content, most of which is saturated fat. Coconut milk is a traditional food in ...

. It is served when the broth is reduced to a thick sauce. Lime, butter, and

shallot The shallot is a botanical variety (a cultivar) of the onion. Until 2010, the (French red) shallot was classified as a separate species, ''Allium ascalonicum''. The taxon was synonymized with '' Allium cepa'' (the common onion) in 2010, as the ...

s or leeks may be added to the cooked snails.

References

{{Edible molluscs Philippine cuisine Foods containing coconut Snail dishes

Background

Description

See also

References