It's Grand Really

Stunning in its Understatement
I actually watched this video for the entire 4:06. I can't tell you, I just, I - what would POSSESS someone to post this! I mean it's useful. Please imagine for a second the person behind the camera. They stood over a bowl of clams, one of nature's most inanimate living objects, for FOUR MINUTES. Arresting.



Inspired by the best linguine white clam sauce I've ever tasted (prepared by the Golden Goddess, she of Legend fame), I give you my recipe for spaghetti and Manila clams. As a soup fiend, I love it when my sauces collect at the bottom of the bowl and wait for me to finish the pasta before I tuck in for a delicious, passionate, saucy finale. Slurping sauce off a fork for ten minutes is the reason I love food, and in turn, life.

This is not linguine white clam sauce, the Italian-American standby. That's a simple recipe too, but I would use bigger, littleneck clams for that. Whereas linguine white clam sauce is most delicious with each component cranked to 11 (garlic, clam juice, cheese, parseley, butter, olive oil), my spaghetti Manila clams relies on a more delicate harmony of flavors.

The idea with this dish is to let each component impart its freshness onto the just-undercooked spaghetti (which I prefer to linguine because it's lighter). I leave the clam shells right in the bowl because I want the essences of the clam juices to mix with the pasta as much as possible. I use tiny pieces of crispy diced bacon and hope that they find their way to some nook in the clam, because everytime you eat cured pork meat and shellfish in the same bite, a baby stops crying.

z911spaghettiManilaclams
Serves 4 as a first course
Serves 2 if you're a close friend of mine

1 lb. Manila clams (2 or 3 dozen), scrubbed under cold water
6 strips of bacon, trimmed of fat and diced
1/2 lb. good spaghetti (like DeCecco), split in half lengthwise
2 cloves garlic, 1 razor-thinly sliced, the other cut in half

small baguette, cut into half inch slices
extra virgin olive oil
parseley, chopped
red pepper flakes

1. Fill pot with water, salt aggressively, transfer to stove on high heat
2. Bring water to a boil, drop in the pasta, stir immediately.

3. Pour a glug or five of olive oil into a saute pan and heat slowly, drop in the garlic halves. Just as they turn golden, throw the bacon in the pan. Bring the heat up slowly so the bacon crisps up. Remove the garlic.

4. Lightly dunk both sides of the baguette pieces in the garlic/bacon oil, place in a broiler pan or some tin foil and broil/toast until crispy.

5. Meanwhile, in the saute pan, introduce the clams and the thinly-sliced garlic. Splash the pan with a some pasta water to coat the surface of the pan, or, if you're so inclined, use white wine here. Cover the pan so the steam circulates and cooks the clams' muscles into submission (causing them to open).

6. Once the pasta is about two minutes shy of recommended cooking time, transfer it to the saute pan using tongs. You definitely want some of the pasta water to hit the clam juice/bacon/garlic/olive oil mixture. Cover the saute pan again and cook for a minute more.

7. Take a crostini piece and place one in each serving bowl.
8. Add a pinch of red pepper flakes and a pinch of parseley to the pasta and clams, and mix well. Serve the pasta over the top of each crostini, making sure you portion out the sauce evenly.

Notes and Tasty Substitutions
You can definitely purchase premade crostini or croutons at any supermarket. They'll work fine. To that point, if you don't add enough of the pasta water to the oil mixture, you won't get enough liquid to soak the bread and make it taste delicious. At the same time, if you drown everything in salty water the subtlety of the clam juices and garlic/bacon oil will be lost. You're going for a greyish solution with globs of olive oil to coat the bottom of your saute pan. I would top the dish with a quick drizzle of olive oil.

In my mind, Manila clams are the poor man's cockles. I get my Manila clams on Grand Street for about $3.99/lb. That means you can easily pull this dish off for under $10.

Cockles are these vibrant, symmetrical, uniform little clams. If you can find and afford cockles, more power to ya.

Substitute pancetta for bacon? Definitely. In general pancetta has a more subdued flavor, and the theme of this dish is to remove knock-you-over-the-head-ingredients.