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Clams
Clams are a kind of cockle, and are to be found on the west coast of Ireland and Scotland, and in Devonshire, Cornwall, and some parts of Wales. Though they figure largely in American cookery, they are not much used in England; but persons living on the sea-shore might make several by no means despicable dishes from them. Soyer says that they "are much superior in flavour to the oyster, and, if eaten raw, should be about the same size; but, if larger, should be made into soup, or cooked in the same way as the oyster." In America they are stewed. The clams are put into a stewpan, with a little water at the bottom of the pan, then boiled for twenty-five or thirty minutes, the scum carefully removed, and the juice seasoned with pepper and salt. Clams may also be egged and bread-crumbed and fried in boiling fat.
This is half reference entry, half method, and the method is where it goes wrong: nothing in the clam benefits from half an hour in a pan. Read the timings as period practice rather than instruction.
- The timing is the hingeTwenty-five to thirty minutes turns clam meat to rubber. Hard-shell clams steam open in roughly five to eight minutes over a lively heat, and they are done the moment the shells gape; any that stay shut after a few extra minutes should be discarded.
- Why the old books boiled so longLong boiling of this kind may reflect larger, tougher specimens and an interest in the broth rather than the meat, though the entry itself gives no reason. If you want a strong clam liquor for soup, simmer the strained juice long after the clams have been lifted out, not with them in it.
- "Stewpan"A straight-sided saucepan with a lid, not the modern casserole dish. A wide pan with a tight lid works better here, since the clams want to sit in a single layer over the water.
- Purging and gritThe recipe says nothing about it. Soak live clams in cold salted water for an hour or two to let them spit out sand, and strain the finished liquor through muslin regardless.
- "Boiling fat" for fryingFat does not boil at frying temperatures; the phrase means fat hot enough to bubble fiercely around what is dropped in, roughly 350-375F by modern reckoning. Egged and crumbed clam meats need one to two minutes, no more.
- Clams and cocklesThe entry treats them as one thing. In practice the British shore species here are cockles and various clams of quite different sizes; American recipes of this period mean hard-shell quahogs or soft-shell steamers, which behave differently in the pan.
- Raw shellfishSoyer's suggestion of eating small ones raw assumes shellfish gathered from clean water. Bivalves filter-feed and concentrate whatever is in it, so raw consumption today should be limited to shellfish from certified harvest areas.
- YieldNone is given. Reckon on about a pound of clams in the shell per person as a starter, roughly two pounds for a main dish with bread.
Cassell's is unusually frank here about a national blind spot: clams were abundant on British and Irish shores and almost entirely ignored on British tables, while American cookery had built stews, chowders and clambakes around them. The Soyer quoted is Alexis Soyer, chef of the Reform Club and the most quotable culinary authority of mid-Victorian England, whose opinions were still being cited decades after his death in 1858. The dismissal of clams as food for "persons living on the sea-shore" reflects the period's ranking of shellfish by carriage rather than flavour: oysters travelled to market in barrels and had a trade behind them, while cockles and clams stayed local, gathered at low tide and eaten within the day.