Believe it or not, I am tired of all this wonderful seafood!! Have to tell Teri, No More (for a while!). Second bucketful in two weeks and I don't want to put anything in the freezers yet!!
Last night's was really good tho and thought some of you might want to try it. It could be made with canned clams also, but it was so simple and tasty. It's a Nigella Lawson recipe - I just love the way she writes a recipe.
Spaghetti Alle Vongole – Nigella Lawson
4 cups small clams
10 oz. spaghetti
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup olive oil
3/4 tsp. dried red pepper flakes
2/3 cup white wine or Noilly Prat
3 T. chopped parsley
Put the clams to soak in a sinkful of cold water, while you heat the water for the pasta. When the water comes to the boil, add salt and then the spaghetti. Cook the spaghetti until nearly but not quite ready: you're going to give it a fractional amount more cooking with the clams and their winey juices so you need to leave room for absorption. Try and time this so that the pasta's ready at the time
you want to plunge it into the clams. Otherwise drain and douse with a few drops of olive oil.
Mince, grate or finely slice the garlic and, in a pan with a lid into which you can fit the pasta later, fry it gently (it mustn't burn) in the olive oil and then crumble in the red chili pepper flakes. Drain the clams, discarding those that remain open, and add the closed ones to the garlic pan. Pour over the wine or vermouth and cover. In 2 minutes, the clams should be open. Add the pasta, put the lid on again and swirl about. In another minute or so everything should have finished cooking and come together: the pasta will have cooked to the requisite tough tenderness and absorbed the salty, garlicky, winey clam juices, and be bound in a wonderful sea-syrup. But if the pasta needs more cooking, clamp on the lid and give it more time. Chuck out any clams that have failed to open.
Add half the parsley, shake the pan to distribute evenly, and turn into a plate bowl and sprinkle over the rest of the parsley. Cheese is not grated over any pasta with fish in it in Italy (nor indeed where garlic is the predominant ingredient, either) and the rule holds good. You need add nothing. It's perfect as it is. If perfection can be improved upon, however, the thing that will do it is a glass of icy cold and flinty white wine or an almost-freezing beer to be drunk alongside.
Six dishes of clams and oysters (plus leftovers from yesterday) in two weeks is just too much rich food for me.
P.S. - Just remembered I wanted to mention that my parsley plant has suffered from over cutting during this marathon with seafood, and I read recently about using carrot tops in a pasta dish and wanted to try that. So, I subbed carrot tops for the parsley in the above dish - nice flavor. I went ahead and grated up the little carrots and added with the garlic at the beginning. I'm anxious to try the tops in other recipes, too.
Last night's was really good tho and thought some of you might want to try it. It could be made with canned clams also, but it was so simple and tasty. It's a Nigella Lawson recipe - I just love the way she writes a recipe.
Spaghetti Alle Vongole – Nigella Lawson
4 cups small clams
10 oz. spaghetti
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup olive oil
3/4 tsp. dried red pepper flakes
2/3 cup white wine or Noilly Prat
3 T. chopped parsley
Put the clams to soak in a sinkful of cold water, while you heat the water for the pasta. When the water comes to the boil, add salt and then the spaghetti. Cook the spaghetti until nearly but not quite ready: you're going to give it a fractional amount more cooking with the clams and their winey juices so you need to leave room for absorption. Try and time this so that the pasta's ready at the time
you want to plunge it into the clams. Otherwise drain and douse with a few drops of olive oil.
Mince, grate or finely slice the garlic and, in a pan with a lid into which you can fit the pasta later, fry it gently (it mustn't burn) in the olive oil and then crumble in the red chili pepper flakes. Drain the clams, discarding those that remain open, and add the closed ones to the garlic pan. Pour over the wine or vermouth and cover. In 2 minutes, the clams should be open. Add the pasta, put the lid on again and swirl about. In another minute or so everything should have finished cooking and come together: the pasta will have cooked to the requisite tough tenderness and absorbed the salty, garlicky, winey clam juices, and be bound in a wonderful sea-syrup. But if the pasta needs more cooking, clamp on the lid and give it more time. Chuck out any clams that have failed to open.
Add half the parsley, shake the pan to distribute evenly, and turn into a plate bowl and sprinkle over the rest of the parsley. Cheese is not grated over any pasta with fish in it in Italy (nor indeed where garlic is the predominant ingredient, either) and the rule holds good. You need add nothing. It's perfect as it is. If perfection can be improved upon, however, the thing that will do it is a glass of icy cold and flinty white wine or an almost-freezing beer to be drunk alongside.
Six dishes of clams and oysters (plus leftovers from yesterday) in two weeks is just too much rich food for me.
P.S. - Just remembered I wanted to mention that my parsley plant has suffered from over cutting during this marathon with seafood, and I read recently about using carrot tops in a pasta dish and wanted to try that. So, I subbed carrot tops for the parsley in the above dish - nice flavor. I went ahead and grated up the little carrots and added with the garlic at the beginning. I'm anxious to try the tops in other recipes, too.
Retired and having fun writing cookbooks, tasting wine and sharing recipes with all my friends.
www.achefsjourney.com
www.achefsjourney.com