Skip to main content
Main

Clam Patties

Clam Patties are a savory dish made with clams, stock, cream, and a flour‑butter thickener.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Clam Patties

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stock

  1. Scald the clams in their own liquor and remove the hard parts.

  2. Prepare a stock by simmering chicken bones, carrot, parsley, celery, onion, and salt in a pint of water for two hours.

  3. Strain the stock and add the liquor from half a can of mushrooms or a ⅓ cup of oyster liquor.

Make the filling

  1. Boil the mixture until about ⅓ cup remains, then add ½ cup of cream and the clams.

  2. Thicken with a mixture of 1 tablespoon flour and 1 tablespoon butter cooked in a separate saucepan.

  3. Stir the stock and liquor into the thickened mixture until it gently boils, then remove from heat.

  4. Optionally, add chopped oysters or mushrooms for extra flavor.

Serve

  1. Fill the cases with the hot filling and serve on a napkin or silver dish.

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  2. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  5. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Clams
Provide the main flavor and the bulk of the filling.
Cream
Adds richness and body to the filling as it reduces.
Flour
Thickens the liquid into a smooth, sliceable filling when cooked with butter.
Butter
Fat that cooks with the flour to form a roux for thickening.
Carrot
Adds subtle sweetness and aroma to the stock.

The step that matters

Thickening with the flour and butter roux. Flour must be cooked in the butter before adding liquid; otherwise it stays starchy and can taste raw. Stirring until the mixture gently boils lets the starch swell and thicken evenly, without lumps forming.

Swap the celery

The recipe marks celery as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clam, carrot, parsley, onion, cream, flour, butter):

  1. Celerythe original
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Garlicfits about as well
  4. Nutmegfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, carrot, parsley, onion, cream, flour, butter. 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.

You might also like

Carrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesCream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipesCelery StewCelery Stew25 recipesMock Oyster SoupMock Oyster Soup21 recipes