linguini with clam sauce
Thursday, September 18

had a BLAST making linguini with clam sauce. takes less than 30 min. (w/ E)

ingredients:
- package linguini
- olive oil
- butter
- 4 garlic cloves, sliced thinly
- can of baby clams
- fresh parsley
- salt & pepper
- parmesan cheese

directions:
sauce
1. heat olive oil in pan. (and start boiling water in a large pot for the linguini)
2. add garlic, heat until brown.
3. add can of baby clams (+ clam juice in the can)

linguine
4. linguini into pot of boiling water. (SALT well. ppl always forget to salt the pasta)

5. add a bit of butter to oil/garlic/clam mix.

allow clams to cook for 5 minutes or so.

6. when linguine is al dente (means, to the tooth, or something like that. basically, you don't want limp, pale white pasta. you want pasta that is cooked, but retains some firmness. allowed to have a tiny bit of white, uncookness in the middle. that will cook as you strain.), strain linguine, get as much water off as possible.

7. allow linguine to evaporate away moisture until it is thirsty, then toss with oil/garlic/clam mix. reduce heat.

8. add fresh chopped parsley
9. drizzle additional small amount of olive oil as needed. toss some more, and allow linguini to soak up some more flavor.
10. season with salt and pepper to taste (salt is usually unnecessary, since the clam juice is pretty salty)
11. sprinkle some parmesan.

VIOLA!

so easy. so good. i now have at least 3 pasta dishes that are pretty dependable.

all i can say, is, it's all about the JOY of cooking.

****
edit: to enhance above dish

(as suggested by anna): add some scallops (brown on a non stick wok) with a touch of lime
(as suggested by tim): add white wine during step 3
(as suggested by kristi): add crushed red pepper flakes with salt and pepper (the stuff you get at pizza parlors or domino's delivery) i actually did this part, but i forgot to list it. sorry. :P


yakob at 3:28 AM

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