Thai Steamer Clams

We love steamer clams. It's part of living in the Northwest as G's learned. Having grown up in the land locked Midwest steamer clams and shellfish just weren't things he grew up eating but over the years he's become just as big of a fan of them as I am.

One of our most favorite preparations for clams is to prepare them with our favorite Thai flavors.  

First, its important to thoroughly clean your clams. There is nothing delicious about eating sand even if it is Thai flavored. We scrub ours with a vegetable brush first to remove any lose sand that might be hanging onto them, then we filter them with cold water 4-5 times.( I fill a pot with cold water, let them sit for 5-10 minutes then drain the water off. Repeating that process 4-5 times.) Doing this rarely leaves us any trace of sand in our clams.

Next we create our steaming broth. When we go with this Thai version we use white wine, butter, lemongrass, ginger, red pepper flake and some shallot.

Once the broth starts to bubble we add the clams and cover the dutch oven until the clams start opening.

Once the clams are all open we add some fresh cilantro and bust out some crusty bread to sop up that wonderful broth.

For these clams G picked up a bottle of this spectacular Heron Chardonnay from Sonoma. It was so good with the clams. Perfectly balanced with broth's flavors. We can't wait to have it again actually.

There's really nothing that we like more than a nice evening, eating clams on the patio with a fantastic wine. Truly, it's pretty much what makes us the happiest.I guess we're pretty simple that way.

We'd love to know what your favorite backyard meal is?

Recipe:

Thai Steamer Clams

(measurements are approximate. We make this so often that we don't measure.)

2 lbs. steamer clams (manila)

2 cups dry white wine

3 Tblspns butter

2 Tblspns chopped lemongrass

2-3 large pieces of ginger

2 Tblspns diced shallot

2 tspns red pepper flake

salt & pepper

3 Tblspns chopped cilantro

Scrub and clean clams thoroughly. In a dutch oven place wine, butter, lemongrass, ginger, shallot, pepper flake, salt & pepper. Bring to a simmer. Add clams. Cover 6-10 minutes, or until clams are open. Garnish with cilantro. Serve with crusty bread.