During the gold and avocado velour years, my family would pass the winter holiday break at a shingled time share community on the California cost. We’d play epic games of monopoly or jump off the dunes and at low tide, we’d roll up our pants and follow Dad down to the beach where we’d dig for clams. It must have been frigid cold but we were kids and somehow, kids under the age of 12 are impervious to cold.
Clam digging is wet, messy work, typically followed by peeling off sand permeated denim and heading straight to a hot shower. The clams got a similar treatment, though I seem to remember that their baths involved oatmeal as part of the de-sanding process. Once suitably soaked, overnight, perhaps, Mom transformed them into chowder, Manhattan style red, never New England style white.
James Fraioli’s publisher (or maybe it’s his PR people, I’m sorry, I’ve forgotten) contacted me to see if I’d be interested in a copy of his new book, The Best Recipes from America’s Food Festivals. I rather enjoy testing new recipes, it’s big fun for me. I was an award winning test cook on what we came to fondly call the Cafe F***ing Flora Cookbook, so naturally, I told them to send the book along. Okay, I didn’t actually win any awards, but I did get a nice gift certificate, as did a handful of other persevering friends who were test cooks. And my name is in the thank yous at the front of the book. I’m not kidding about that part.
So. The Festivals book. “Fab!” I thought, upon unpacking it, followed immediately by another one word thought: “Chowder!” Chowder is certainly a popular festival food and as the season turns, chowder has increasing appeal. Thing is, I wasn’t totally inspired by the chowder recipes in the book. “Surely he can’t mean for me to use canned clams,” I thought. [Stand by, readers, Mr. Fraioli has agreed to a Q&A call. On the list of questions: Canned clams. WTF?]
Thinking of chowder made me wonder how hard it could be to work with fresh clams, so I kept flipping through the book. Finally, there was inspiration in something called Mahogany Clams with Wilted Greens. “Clams it is!” says I, and off I went to the fish market.
Let’s just insert a place holder for my weekly love for Seattle Fish Company at the Junction, okay? Okay. Fish place, consider yourselves loved. Mwah.
The fish guy explained to me that you want your clams to be zipped up nice and tight and solid sounding when you tap them on something. That’s how you know they’re good. I bought BC Manila clams as the Mahogany ones named in the recipe weren’t available. For the record, the clam farming process is low impact and apparently these little guys actually do a little cleanup while they’re growing, filtering stuff out of the ecosystem. The recipe called for six pounds, which is a lot of clams, but I bought only a pound for not a lot of clams (heh) at six bucks a pound.
I won’t reproduce the recipe here, I don’t want to do Mr. Fraioli a disservice, but I will say it was easier than easy to make this stuff. Essentially, you throw a bunch of stuff in a pan until it boils, toss in the clams, boil up some pasta, and voila, you’re done. Really. That’s it. As for how it was, well… I liked it but I didn’t love it. The sauce had a tiny bite from the red pepper spicing, but it seemed a bit weak. Even though, in a fit of decadence, I used the real butter the recipe called for instead of my customary olive oil substitute. I suspect that, like any good stew, it will be quite good tomorrow after it’s sat for a bit – and I do have enough leftover for lunch.
The recipe comes to the book by way of the Yarmouth Clam Festival. Up in Coupeville, on Whidbey Island, there’s a Mussel Festival – the book has recipes from that festival as well and my fish guy has mussels as well as clams. That seems like a hilarious starting point for a double entendre, but at this point, I’ll just clam up and say that there’s more cooking to do before the “Festivals” book gets the Fish Wednesday seal of approval. Stand by.
I didn’t do a Fish Wednesday post last week, but I did have fish dinner because I was testing the freezability (is that a word?) of my Brazilian Fish Stew. The stew itself – the liquid part – held up just fine, better than fine, really, but the shrimp did not reheat well and the cod was tough. I’m not sure what the solution is other than to eat all the seafood in the first sitting and to add fresh seafood to any leftovers you might have. Disappointing and off the cards for Soup Swap.
As always, I love to know when you’re adopting the Fish Wednesday way of life, even when it’s not Wednesday, so let me know, wouldja? Finally, for no good reason at all beyond the shellfish connection, here’s a link to The Walrus and the Carpenter. As a younger and even nerdier lass, I could recite the entire poem from memory.
[tags]Fish Wednesday, clams, seafood[/tags]
As part of my food education, are you saying that some items, like shrimp or cod, lose their appeal when frozen after cooking? Are they in an air-locked container?
Neil, I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic, dammit.
Yes, some items are not so good frozen, some work totally fine. Chili, for example, freezes surprisingly well, as does that eggplant curry I made a month ago. But the fish? Not so good. And yes, they’re in airtight containers.
I wasn’t being sarcastic. I’m frequently confused about why some foods taste fine after being frozen, while others lose all their taste.