What's Cooking With Dive? Razor Clams

Razor clams! Yay!

Today, to the horror of our more squeamish Blogville neighbours, Old Dive is going to be steaming these wriggly little fuckers in their own tears.
Woohoo!

Don't worry; I'll be adding lots of wine so they'll die shit-faced and happy.
And then I'll eat them.
Yum!


So … Razorclams … These guys are spiffy.
Feisty little doo-dads with a great personality.
They just luurve getting a good rinse; their feet come out and waggle around happily.
Lean your head down and you'll hear their little voices piping up at you …
"Me! Me! … Me first! I wanna go first! Let me bathe in that yummy hot wine!"

Rinse them really well in cold water (or sea water if you live close enough to the beach) as they tend to spit sand.
Some people parboil razorclams and then cut off the dark gut section but not me; I like wine too much and I am humane enough to want to give the little guys a last drink.
Just leave the dark bit on the side of the plate. That's the part where all the sand is, so you can eat the rest without unnecessary crunchy bits marring the succulence.

A tomato, garlic, onion, red wine and olive sauce is good with these but any hint of a sauce with seafood grosses Lynn out so today I'll be steaming them using white wine and herbs and a quick side salad of chorizo, broad beans and shallots, together with some wakame seaweed to make our little friends feel at home.

Chorizo … check.

Broad beans … Whop 'em in the steamer for three minutes or so.

Then heat up your best olive oil (you've heard me swear about this stuff so many times so I won't repeat myself here), add good garlic and a couple of shallots finely chopped (save half for the next part) and let them go all silky and transparent.
Add the wafer-thin chorizo and let it sweat some of the fat out into the oil and onions and then toss in the beans for the last minute.

Quick. Easy. Tasty.

Meanwhile, in another pan (heavy, flat-bottomed, non-stick frying pan with a glass lid with a built in steamer vent), heat up more olive oil and liquify the other half of the shallots and garlic.
Then add rather a lot of really, really good white wine (time to break out the Chablis), a little at a time until it is simmering away and filling the kitchen with pure joy.
Have a glug yourself while you're at it. Get those tastebuds perked up for the treat to come.

It's about now that tossing in a dozen basil leaves and a bunch of parsley would be a good idea but - as you can see - I forgot and had to throw them in later.

Now, take those happy, wriggling razor clams and give them a few good squeezes each.
Do it over the sink as they'll squirt water everywhere.
Then pop them into the hot wine and whap that lid on sharpish!
Where the water was hugged out of them, they'll suck up lots of Chablis and herbs and die extremely happy.

Two and a half minutes is the absolute maximum these guys want to be in there.
After only a few seconds you'll see them all open up (discard any that don't open, but then you knew that anyway).
These were really fat, healthy, fresh clams from David and so they all opened and were all totally Heavenly.

Half a dozen each is about right.
Stick 'em on a plate and get in there!
The rich fattiness of the chorizo and bean salad, the glorious herby wine cutting through it, the clean taste of wakame and the utterly orgasmic succulence of the razorclams makes for a delicious combination.

Boffo!