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[quote:1hbfgse4]More often than not the pot was never filled as we would eat the cockles there and then[/quote:1hbfgse4]

wow! raw cockles?
Never tried that, I wonder if it's safe (I guess you're here to tell the tale)?

Last time I picked cockles they were tasty - just boiled and eaten with malt vinegar - but very gritty.
Anyone know a way to flush the sand out of them that doesn't take days?

I think most people just haven't been exposed to them. For those of us from the cities, without a pastoral youth of living off the fat of the land to look back on, the familiar foods are those we have encountered in shops and restaurants. I have never seen cockles on a menu and only encountered them as part of a seafood risotto. As a matter of fact, I just hit google for a picture of one, to make sure I was thinking of the right mollusc.

I can't recall them on a menu either (certainly not in recent times). And even in the likes of risotto or chowder they seem to be a rarity.


The Kid, there does seem to be a reference in Wiki about the dangers of raw cockles, but as you said, we're still around *touches wood*.

I discussed this issue with my fisherman, cockles being amongst my favourites shells.
He told me they couldn't be grown easily like mussels. And to harvest them - on an industrial scale - you need to rake the sand, which is neither convenient nor good for the fauna. On the top of it all, cockles will not keep well for long, you're talking one day before being improper for sell.
Finally, as Séan mentioned, there's not a particular taste/awareness for them in Ireland.

The Kid : before you cook the cockles, you have to bath them for a good while, maybe three hours wouldn't be too much, changing the salty water from time to time. And make sure you check ALL of them are alive. The last thing you want is to have a shell full of sand opening during the boil (yes, it happened to me).

[quote:2xerd8em]The last thing you want is to have a shell full of sand opening during the boil (yes, it happened to me).[/quote:2xerd8em]

Maybe that's what happened to me too!
Thanks