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To Roast Clams
Wash them and put on a gridiron over the hot coals.
When the shells open, remove the upper one, and serve in the under shell at once with a bit of butter and a little pepper on each.
A four-line recipe that depends entirely on reading the shells. Everything else is seasoning.
- The hinge: open means doneThe shell springs open when the adductor muscle cooks through, and that is the finish line. Another minute over coals and the clam turns to rubber in its own shell.
- Gridiron equivalentsA gridiron is a flat grate set directly over coals. A charcoal or gas grill grate works unchanged; indoors, a dry cast-iron skillet over high heat or a sheet pan under the broiler will do the same job.
- Which clamsUse hard-shell clams that will sit flat and hold liquor: littlenecks, topnecks, or small cherrystones. Soft-shell (steamer) clams gape permanently and will not hold the juice in the lower shell.
- Washing means more than rinsingScrub the shells under cold running water and discard any that are cracked or that stay open when tapped. If the clams are sandy, an hour in cold salted water lets them spit grit out before they go near the fire.
- Cup side downSet them with the deeper half against the grate so the liquor collects there rather than hissing into the coals. That liquor plus the butter is the entire sauce.
- Butter and pepperSoftened butter is easier to spread on a hot shell than a cold pat. The recipe specifies only 'a little pepper' and does not say which kind; black pepper is the usual reading.
- YieldThe recipe gives no quantities. As a modern guide, six to eight clams per person as a first course and a dozen or more as a main; cook in batches small enough that every shell can be lifted the moment it opens.
Roasting clams in the shell over coals is often said to be the oldest way to eat them on the American Atlantic coast, predating European settlement; shell heaps along New England and Mid-Atlantic shores show that clams were eaten in quantity, though not which method of cooking was used. It reads as a summer recipe because it belongs to the shore and the open fire rather than the kitchen range — a dish for the season when nobody wants a stove lit. The instruction to serve "in the under shell at once" is the whole argument for the technique: no pot, no water, nothing between the clam and the plate, and none of its liquor lost. Collections of hot-weather cookery leaned heavily on shellfish for exactly this reason, and clams were then cheap and abundant.