Studies on the quality of comparable commercial foods made from snails of different species

According to the guidelines of the German Food Book products of two species of the genus Helix, H. pomatia and H. aspersa, may be labelled as vineyard snail, but not the commercially important species of H. lucorum, In the pr esent study the quality and sensory properties of H. pomatia, H. lucorum an d Achatina species were compared by sensory assessment and measurement of t exture and colour. DNA-analysis (PCR-RFLP) was used for differentiation of species. The sensory properties of the 3 species were found to be very simi lar, and not to be suited for differentiation. In contrast to this finding, the physical tests revealed some differences between species. By PCR-RFLP DNA-fragment patterns were obtained allowing unambiguous differentiation of the 3 species.