No. 997

Stuffed Clams

Lucines Orangees Farcies

Fry colorless two ounces of finely chopped onions in two ounces of butter, dredge over two spoonfuls of flour, stir well, then add the liquor from ten raw clams, two ounces of chopped mushrooms, and one gill of white wine; boil up the whole, skim off the foam arising to the top, and reduce to half, seasoning with red pepper and nutmeg. Chop up the raw clams, and set them into the prepared sauce; place it on a brisk fire and stir steadily, and when the clams are poached, add some chopped parsley, and thicken with egg-yolks and cream. Lay this preparation aside for further use, but if it is to be used at once, fill up some well rounded buttered clam shells, dust over with bread-crumbs and lay a small pat of butter on top of each; place them on a baking pan in the oven to heat and color nicely, then arrange them crown-shaped on a folded napkin, garnishing the center with very green parsley branches.

LONG OR SOFT CLAMS (Lucines).

Long or soft clams resemble somewhat the Venus clam, however, they have no exterior tube. These mollusks live in both sand and mud.

← No. 996 Clam Pancakes and Fritters Clams No. 998 Soft Clams Fried, Garnished with Fried Parsl →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer's stuffed clams are essentially a clam velouté finished with an egg-and-cream liaison, spooned back into the shells and browned. The sauce is where the whole dish is won or lost.

The liaison must not boilOnce the egg yolks and cream go in, keep the pan off direct heat and stir until the sauce thickens to a coating consistency. A boil after the yolks are added will scramble them and the filling will break into grains and weep in the oven.
Poach the clams brieflyChopped raw clams need under a minute in the simmering sauce. "When the clams are poached" meant just set and opaque; hold them longer and they turn to rubber, which no amount of butter and crumbs will disguise.
A gillHalf a cup, four fluid ounces. "Two spoonfuls of flour" in this book most likely means tablespoons, which is well under the two ounces of butter by weight.
Clam liquor quantityTen raw clams yield very little liquid, and how much depends entirely on the clams. Expect to make up the difference with bottled clam juice or light fish stock so the roux has something to work with; the sauce is then reduced by half, so it should start fairly loose.
Brisk fire and the oven"Brisk" is a high burner. The recipe gives no oven temperature; a hot oven for 8 to 10 minutes is enough -- the filling is already cooked and only needs heating through and coloring. A brief pass under the broiler at the end sets the crumbs.
Which clamThe heading calls for soft-shell clams (steamers), whose thin shells are poor containers. Modern versions commonly use hard-shell littlenecks or cherrystones, whose deep rounded half-shells hold the filling and can be scrubbed and reused. Ranhofer's own "well rounded" shells point the same way.
Red pepperCayenne, used sparingly — a pinch. It is a seasoning here, not a heat element, and works with the nutmeg to lift an otherwise mild cream sauce.
YieldTen clams' worth of filling fills about eight to ten half-shells: a first course for four. The recipe says the preparation may be laid aside for further use, so it can be made ahead, then filled and baked to order.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of some thirty years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and this recipe shows the house method plainly: an American shellfish handled entirely by French technique, down to the veloutase and the white wine reduction and the liaison of yolks and cream. The French heading, lucines orang\looser naming -- "lucine" was applied by nineteenth-century writers to bivalves that modern taxonomy separates, and Ranhofer's note distinguishes the soft clam from the Venus clam. Stuffed clams served back in the shell appear on American hotel and restaurant menus of the period, and the presentation directed here -- shells arranged crown-shaped on a folded napkin with a bouquet of parsley at the center -- is conventional nineteenth-century French table dressing.

Century Old Kitchen · Shellfish

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