Linguine with White Clam Sauce

After watching cooking videos on how to make white clam sauce linguine and tasting my roommate's version, I just knew I had to make my own! This dish is flavorful in its own way in that it's doesn't have a powerful seasoned taste to it but more of a subtle seafood taste. Some people don't like the subtlety of its taste, so they would add lots of other herbs and seasoning to it. However, others like the natural flavor of clam and white wine sauce. Today, I tried to cook it the most basic way without experimenting with too many flavors since this was my first time. I've gotta say... not too bad :) The boyfriend loved it and we had a nice spinach salad with some mozzarella, cheese, walnuts, and balsamic vinegar made by him =] (very proud of him) and of course, had a a glass of that white wine that we use in the clam sauce. 

This recipe is adapted from Anne Burrell. I cut the serving size to 2. I combined the techniques that I observed from watching cooking videos along with this recipe to make this dish.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 pound linguine
• 25 fresh live clams (little neck clams)
• about 3/4 cup dry white wine (Sauvignon Blanc, or Pinot Grigo)
• 6 cloves of garlic
• 1/2 tbs of butter
• salt
• red pepper flakes
• extra virgin olive oil
• mesh strainer
• coffee sieve paper 

Protocol:

1. Soak the clams in cold water for at least 30 minutes, the longer the better. You want the sand to collect at the bottom. Scrub them really well under running cold water. 
• If you have a stiff brush, use that. I didn't, so I had to scrub 2 clams against each other. After you scrub them, make sure they are dried off as much as possible!
• No matter how much you scrub these clams, they will always have some sand. I scrubbed them about 3-4 times and every time the water gets cloudy, meaning there's sand. I'll show you the technique later that avoids letting the sand get in. 
2. Chop up 3 cloves of garlic and mince 3 cloves of garlic. (You can actually use a many cloves of garlic as you want.) Set them aside. 
3. Coat a medium sauce pan with extra virgin olive oil. Sautee the chopped garlic cloves in the oil until they are brown. Discard the garlic cloves. 
• We want the garlic flavor to infuse into the oil, not eat them. Add red pepper flakes. 
4. Put in about 10 clams into the sauce pan and pour about a cup of white wine into the pan. If there's not enough liquid, add some water. Cover the pan with a lid and steam them until the clams open up. (5-10 minutes)
5. Take the clams out. Set them aside. 
6. Prepare a bowl with a mesh strainer resting over it. Place a coffee sieve paper on the mesh strainer and strain the clam juice from the sauce pan. Save the clam juice and set it aside.
• Do it as many times if not all of the liquid goes through the first time. The clam juice in the bowl will be pretty much clear, which is what you want. 
7. Again, coat the same sauce pan with olive oil and toss in the MINCED garlic. 
• This time, we will only sautee them until they are lightly brown. We're not tossing them away. 
8. Place the rest of the 15 clams into the pan and add the clam juice into the sauce pan. Cover lid and steam until they open up. (5-10 minutes)
9. Meanwhile, boil your linguine in a pot for about 8-9 minutes or until they're al-dente. 
• Salt lightly the boiling water since the clam juice is quite salty and it's easier to put in salt than take out salt. 
10. After the clams open up, take them out and wait for them to cool to deshell the clams. 
11. Add the deshelled clams back into the sauce pan and add about a table spoon of butter to thicken up the sauce. 
12. strain the pasta when it's done and toss it in with the clams and its juice! 
13. Add some olive oil if you like it to be more thick or rich. Add some salt and pepper to taste.
14. Add the rest of the clams that are still in their shells into the pasta and garnish with them
15. If you want the sauce to be more thick, let it sit in the pan for a while longer or add some parmigiano regianno. I didn't have any cheese on hand, so I had to skip this step, but the butter seemed to thicken the sauce up quite a lot after a while! 

After the sauce got absorbed into the linguine, you can taste that all the clam juice and seafood flavor is in that pasta. It tastes like the sea! 

Few tips:

• you don't need to have some of the clams deshelled and others shelled. You can leave them all shelled and boil them at the same time if that makes life easier. That was for garnishing. 
• Boil the clams with beer next time. My roommate did that and my boyfriend and I found that the clams were much more flavorful than the way these were steamed. I would do that next time and maybe add the white wine later in the sauce. 
• Get a stiff brush to scrub those clams!! It would make things a lot easier :(
• Add more garlic and pepper and other flavorings if needed. Add parsley, or oregano. 
• Add some grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese. I know there's the thing: no cheese and seafood! doesn't work! Well, from the recipe I showed you, Anne Burrell did and so did many others. I think cheese with anything tastes great. If I had shredded Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese I would've used it. It would've been a great way to thicken up the sauce and bring more flavor to the dish. 

On the side, my sous-chef boyfriend made the salad: 

 It was very simple: just some fresh spinach, 1 cut up strawberry, a few diced up mozzarella cheese and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar. 

We paired our dinner with some nice white wine that was used for our clam sauce and had a lovely dinner date :) 

Enjoy the recipe! Good luck in the kitchen!