Spaghetti with Clams

Clam Pasta - Spaghetti Alle Vongole - Delicious; whatever you want to call it, this dish is a big time hit and one you can whip out and whip up quick quick.

Serves: 5
Prep: 15 mins
Cook: 15 mins
Difficulty: Easy

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Ingredients

Olive oil
3 eschallots, finely sliced
8 cloves garlic, finely sliced
500g clams / vongole / cockles
½ cup white wine
Black pepper, freshly ground
500g spaghetti, cooked to al dente
2 tbs salted butter
Parsley, finely chopped

Method

In a high sided frying pan, gently cook the eschallots and garlic in a very generous helping of olive oil. Take your time here and just soften everything. You don't want to caramelise or worse, burn (at this stage you can pause the cooking process, see note below).
Increase the heat of the pan to high. Once hot, add clams along with wine and cover, toss while covered allowing the clams to steam and open.
Once all the clams have opened, add in your cooked and drained pasta (reserving a little pasta water just in case) along with a knob of butter and parsley. Toss well to coat and combine the sauce with the butter.
Serve to a large platter or serving bowl with more parsley to garnish and if you dare, a little parmesan cheese.

Notes

⁠ ⁠Choose your favourite shellfish for this recipe, or, more importantly, what is looking fresh and available local to you. Could also look to use prawns for this dish.

⁠ ⁠What I like to do for this dish when I am entertaining is cook the eschallots, garlic in the oil with some salt and pepper ahead of time, leave them to sit in the pan or in a dish until you want to cook and finish the dish, this takes away the time of cooking when friends are around and i feel it also helps develop the flavours a little more. Then when it is time to cook, everything goes into one pan and it’s pretty much done, served fresh and hot.