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Stuffed Devilled Clams
Open twelve large, fresh clams and place them in a saucepan with their own liquor, adding half pint cold water, and boil for five minutes. Drain well, chop them up very finely and keep on a plate. Thoroughly clean six of the best half shells, finely chop up one medium white onion and place it in a small saucepan with one ounce butter and fry to a nice light colour, lightly stirring meanwhile. Add two tablespoons flour, stir well and heat for half minute; then add half pint of the clam liquor, mix well and boil for two minutes; add the chopped clams. Season with one saltspoon cayenne pepper, a saltspoon grated nutmeg, a teaspoon English mustard and a tablespoon Worcestershire sauce. Mix well and slowly cook for ten minutes; add one teaspoon chopped parsley and half bean finely chopped garlic; mix a little and cook for five minutes more. Then add four tablespoons bread crumbs and two egg yolks; mix thoroughly and cook for two minutes longer. Transfer the forcemeat into a bowl and let thoroughly cool off. Fill the six cleaned half shells with the preparation, nicely rounding the top of each. Spread evenly a devilled butter, over them. Place the shells in a baking tin, sprinkle a very little fresh bread crumbs over them; set in the oven to bake for ten minutes, or until they attain a good golden colour. Remove and serve.
An Edwardian restaurant preparation: clams cooked, chopped, bound into a thick sauce and baked back in their own shells. The measurements are of their time and one or two of the terms have dropped out of use.
- SaltspoonA saltspoon is a quarter teaspoon. A quarter teaspoon of cayenne in six shells is aggressive but deliberate — this is a "devilled" dish. Scale it back if you want the clam to show through.
- Half pintHalf a US pint is one cup (8 fl oz). The recipe asks for a cup of water at the start and then a cup of the resulting liquor for the sauce, so you should have plenty; strain it through muslin, as clam liquor almost always carries sand.
- Which clams"Twelve large, fresh clams" is not specific, but the recipe needs six sturdy half shells deep enough to mound filling into, which points to hard-shell clams of cherrystone size or larger rather than littlenecks or steamers. The recipe asks only that the reserved shells be thoroughly cleaned.
- Don't overcook the clamsFive minutes at a boil is already past the point where clam meat firms up, and the flesh then simmers in the sauce for a further seventeen minutes and bakes for ten. The fine chopping is what saves the texture; chop the meat properly small or it will read as rubber.
- Half bean of garlicA "bean" of garlic in books of this period is usually taken to mean a clove, though it is sometimes read as a bean-sized piece. Either way the quantity is tiny for the whole batch — garlic is a background note here, not a headline.
- English mustardPowdered mustard (Colman's and its equivalents) is the likely intention. Prepared English mustard from a jar gives comparable heat; the recipe adds mustard and Worcestershire together in the same seasoning step.
- Devilled butterNo recipe for it is given here. It is generally butter creamed with mustard and cayenne, sometimes with Worcestershire, lemon or anchovy. Soften an ounce or two, work the seasonings in, and spread it thin over the mounded shells before crumbing.
- OvenNo temperature is given. Ten minutes to a good golden colour on a shallow, already-cooked filling suggests a hot oven; something in the region of 425F is a workable modern guess, or finish under the broiler for the last minute.
- YieldSix filled shells — a first course for three, or for six as one shell apiece before a substantial dinner.
Stuffed and devilled clams belong to a family of dishes in which the hard-shell clam is given the same treatment as the French farcie preparations for oysters and mussels. "Devilled" is a British usage, generally traced to the eighteenth century or earlier, for anything treated with mustard, cayenne and a peppery sauce and then browned; Worcestershire sauce, commercially available from the late 1830s, slotted into that formula readily. This dish sits at a seam — a French roux-and-forcemeat method, English seasoning, and an American shellfish. The instruction to cool the mixture thoroughly before filling is the professional detail: a warm forcemeat slumps in the shell and will not hold the rounded top the recipe insists on.