Thursday, June 21, 2007

A Love For Clams

The man and I are crazy over clams cooked in white wine sauce, garlic and onion. Sometimes when we're hungrier than usual, we add pasta to it. Done vongole or aglio e olio.

We refuse to order clams when dining out because we know how cheap this dish really is. The restaurants always overcharge by alot for clams. The clams cost no more than S$4 per packet (about 400grams) at the supermarket. All in all, I don't think this dish cost us more than S$8 to have it at home.


While soaking the clams in ice water and salt, the forums also advised us to sprinkle cornmeal into the mixture for the clams to purge the grit and sand. It could be my imagination. But I fancy that after being 'fed' cornmeal, the clams do taste better. It doesn't have the metallic stink of blood or a bad residual smell of the sea.

I've this strange habit of smiling at the bowl of clams and watching them bubble. I'll be quite obsessed with the bowl during these 4 hours. I'll periodically add ice chips, salt and more cornmeal to the mixture to 'feed' the clams. I've learnt that the optimal soaking time for clams before cooking is 4 hours. There is little or no grit in the clams by the time it's served at the dinner table. 


The man always caution me, "They're just our dinner companions. Don't bond too deeply with them." So wrong!!!

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

muahahahaha!! hoo hoo..woot woot...

okay, it is SO YOU to be doing this sort of thing!

keep smiling! maybe they taste better coz of all the lovin'! hurhur

littlecartnoodles said...

You're such a humane executioner.

ShutterBug said...

hahaha.. thanks for sharing.. it's my fav way of cooking shellfish this way too!

but I use mussels, not a big fan of white clams :D

Anonymous said...

we'd do anything to make the food tastier don't we. massaging the meat, feeding the clams, and in the end we devour them!

Jo said...

hahah! You must add this to that 'weird list'.

Ms Fair Face said...

haha your guy is funny! Dinner companions! And seriously i think u two are really good cooks!

Anonymous said...

oh dear babe. i don't want to be your dinner companion no more. :(

mummybean said...

hahaha :) i didn't know about the cornmeal thing. shall try it out next time! we also don't order clams in restaurants anymore after i started making vongole at home. you realise how ridiculously you've been ripped off.

Anonymous said...

Did you also whisper to them?

imp said...

corsage: *makes a face and sticks out tongue*

lcn: ohhh...anything to lessen my guilt. *blink*

shutterbug: i'm the opposite! i'm not a fan of mussels! my man loves it. so he eats that all by himself!

kikare: well, i considered massaging the fish to defrost it. ;P

jomel: hahah! yea!

mff: heh. thank u! but it's e man can cook. NOT ME!!

jazzgal: awww...now now. i don't eat 2-legged dinner companions!

beanbean: exactly! S$28 for a plate of vongole and only at most 6 clams!!!

sesame: i don't whisper. i coo... :)

Anonymous said...

naaah, much akin to office politics...!!! --__--

imp said...

clamshell: somewhat similar. :) except i don't bother buttering pple up in the office!!!

Anonymous said...

Hahhaha!! what a great sense of humour you two have.. :)