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Deviled Clams

A baked clam dish with cream, butter, eggs, and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Deviled Clams

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the filling

  1. Boil the clams in their own juice until reduced.

  2. Add cream, butter, salt, pepper, onion, and parsley to the clams.

  3. Mix cornstarch with a little milk and add to the clam mixture.

  4. Stir in the chopped hard-boiled eggs.

  5. Remove the mixture from heat.

  6. Beat one egg and mix the beaten egg into the clam mixture.

Bake and serve

  1. Spoon the mixture into clam shells.

  2. Cover the shells with bread crumbs.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until browned.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Clams
Provide the main seafood body and flavor of the filling.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, moist texture to the filling.
Eggs
Bind the filling and set when baked, giving it structure.
Cornstarch
Thickens the clam mixture so it holds together in the shells.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the topping brown.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, browned topping over the filling.

The step that matters

Remove the mixture from heat before adding the beaten egg. Egg proteins set and can scramble if the mixture is too hot, leaving a grainy texture instead of a smooth, bound filling. Letting it cool slightly before mixing in the egg keeps the filling creamy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clam, cream, butter, pepper, parsley, milk, egg):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, cream, butter, pepper, parsley, milk, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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