By Amy Machnak, Sunset recipe editor

I feel confident that I can cook anything. And when given the opportunity to cook something new or unusal, the result falls somewhere between fair and outstanding.

An elk my Dad shot and then butchered in the garage? Check.

Morning glory leaves from a street market in Vietnam? check, check.

Wedding cake for 500 people that looks like it’s destined for the Mad Hatter’s tea party? No problem.

But when our resident test garden gal, Johanna Silver, asked me to cook a few snails that she pulled out of our garden, I became a little...well, intimidated.

I’ve eaten escargot plenty of times. After foie gras and sweet breads, it’s generally a sure thing order for me when I see it on menu. But I’ve never actually cooked it. At least not the fresh ones, still alive and sitting in a tray in our kitchen, living on a cornmeal diet to fatten them up.

Here’s my first dilema: What exactly is a snail? Is it like abalone (which I just learned is a type of sea snail), which cooks very quickly? Or is it more like octopus, which is better cooked longer, to soften the proteins?

I know that I want to cook our snails with the traditional butter, garlic, parsley, etc. and serve them with a nice crusty French baguette. But should I cook them slow and long? Hot and fast? Should they be baked? broiled? sautéed?

I think research in one of those old, dusty, classical French cookbooks on our shelves is called for.