Scalloped Clams
18 opened clams
48 very small dice of fat bacon
6 large clams in shell
4 tablespoons cracker-dust
White pepper
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons minced celery
Have the clams that are in the shell opened carefully, so as not to injure the shells, which are to be used in scalloping the clams. Clean the shells well with brush and water. Lay two clams in each half shell, dust with white pepper, and one-half teaspoon of minced celery, and add four of the bacon dice; cover with a very thin layer of cracker-dust, put a half teaspoon butter on top and bake in the oven until brown.
A tidy piece of arithmetic disguised as a recipe: everything divides evenly once you see that six clams in the shell give twelve half shells.
- The arithmeticSix shell clams yield 12 half shells; 18 shucked clams plus the 6 from the shells make 24, or two per shell. The 48 bacon dice work out to four apiece, and both the celery and butter come to half a teaspoon each. The book gives no yield, though twelve filled shells would portion out to three apiece for four.
- Oven heatNo temperature is given; the direction is simply to bake until brown, as in a range oven judged by eye. A hot oven, in the region of 425F, suits it, roughly 8 to 12 minutes, until the crumbs colour and the bacon has rendered.
- Do not overbakeThis is the hinge. Clams toughen quickly once set, so pull the shells when the crumb layer is brown. If the bacon is still pale at that point, the dice were probably cut too large.
- Cracker-dustFinely rolled soda or common crackers, sifted to a near-powder. Modern saltines crushed in a bag are the closest thing; panko is too coarse and will not sinter into the thin sealing layer the recipe wants.
- Bacon dicePeriod fat bacon was closer to salt pork than to today's thin-sliced smoked rashers. Use slab bacon or salt pork and cut genuinely small, about a quarter inch, so it cooks through in the short bake.
- Steady the shellsSet the filled shells on a bed of coarse rock salt or crumpled foil in the pan. Clam shells rock, and the liquor is the best part of the dish.
- SaltNone is called for and none is needed. Between the clam liquor and the bacon there is plenty. White pepper was conventionally preferred where dark specks would show.
- Buying clamsHard-shell clams, littlenecks or small cherrystones, sold live with shells tightly closed. Ask the fish counter to open six carefully and keep the shells, or open them yourself over a bowl to save the liquor.
"Scalloped" in nineteenth-century cookery meant baked in a shell with crumbs and butter, a usage often traced to the scallop shells said to have served as individual baking dishes; by the time this book appeared the word had drifted to mean any crumb-topped bake, but here it is still literal, the clam's own shell doing the work. Clams with bacon and a crumb top on the half shell is the same idea that later became known as clams casino, a dish generally traced to the Little Casino at Narragansett Pier in Rhode Island in the years around 1917 and popularised in restaurants thereafter. It also shows the period's fondness for exact enumeration: eighteen clams, forty-eight dice of bacon, counted out so a cook could portion twelve shells without measuring twice.