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Steamed Clams

Steamed clams served with a butter, lemon, parsley, and cayenne sauce, accompanied by warmed crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Steamed Clams

Ingredients

Directions

Steam the clams

  1. Place the clams in a steamer, laying them flat to retain juice.

  2. Set the steamer over boiling water, cover tightly, and boil for 30 minutes.

  3. Check if the shells have opened; if not, cover and steam for an additional 10 minutes.

Prepare and serve

  1. Remove the clams, pry off the upper shells, and arrange the lower shells on a flat dish.

  2. In a bowl, mix butter, lemon juice, parsley, salt, and cayenne until creamy.

  3. Spoon the sauce over the clams and serve hot with warmed crackers.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Clam + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together840 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  4. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Clam + parsleytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together232 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Clams
Provide the main protein, and steaming opens their shells as they cook through.
Butter
Adds richness and a creamy body to the sauce that coats the clams.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich butter and the sweet clam flavour.

The step that matters

Check that the shells have opened before serving. Clams that stay closed after steaming may not be safely cooked. Shells that open signal the clam has cooked through, so checking and steaming longer if needed matters.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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