Antonia Lofaso's Linguine with Clams _ Feast of the Seven Fishes _ Food Network

The Art of Creating Perfect Linguini with Clams

It's all about balance and harmony when it comes to creating the perfect Linguini with clams. We start by adding a little bit more butter, allowing the sauce to thicken up and bring out the flavors of the dish. This is where holding on to your pasta sauce becomes crucial - we need to ensure that all of the white wine has been cooked out, the seasoning is correct, and there's no excess saltiness in the broth.

Tasting the broth is essential at this stage, as it helps us gauge whether the seasoning is balanced and if the flavor profile is where we want it to be. We're also careful not to add too much salt, especially when working with delicate ingredients like clams. As a general rule, no salt is needed in these dishes, so we proceed with caution.

While our pasta cooks, we prepare the sauce by adding lemon juice and finishing it off with more butter to emulsify the entire mixture. This step is critical in bringing all the flavors together and creating a smooth, velvety texture that coats the noodles perfectly.

Once our Linguini is cooked al dente, we add it back into the sauce, allowing it to cook for about 2-3 minutes. This is where the pasta absorbs all the delicious flavors of the broth, creating a dish that's both satisfying and flavorful. We're not afraid to use a generous amount of garlic in this recipe - after all, who doesn't love a good dose of pungency with their pasta?

As we finish off the sauce, we squeeze a bit of fresh lemon juice over it, adding a touch of brightness and acidity that cuts through the richness of the butter. A sprinkle of chopped parsley adds freshness and color to the dish, while the clams - cooked to perfection in white wine and herbs - add a pop of flavor and texture.

When it comes to serving Linguini with clams, presentation is key. We like to serve the pasta in a shallow pool, surrounded by the tender clams, which we pull out of their shells just before serving. This allows each diner to enjoy the clams without distractions, savoring every bite of this delicious dish.

Our chef has a very specific way of eating Linguini with clams - she likes to eat it in the shell first, pulling all the clams out and then proceeding to enjoy the pasta with the remaining broth. This is not just about presentation; it's also about respect for the ingredients and the dish itself. And when it comes to enjoying Linguini, there's no shame in going big or small - as long as you bite whatever doesn't make it, you're in culinary heaven.

The Art of Italian Pasta: A Guide to Creating Perfect Linguini with Clams

For those who have not yet learned the art of creating perfect Linguini with clams, let us guide you through this delectable dish. First and foremost, we must start with a good pasta - linguine is the traditional choice for this recipe, but feel free to experiment with other shapes and sizes to find your favorite.

The key to a great Linguini is in the broth itself. A mixture of white wine, garlic, and herbs is simmered until reduced to create a rich and flavorful sauce that coats the pasta perfectly. Don't be afraid to add a bit more butter and lemon juice to enhance the flavors - these two ingredients are essential for creating a dish that's both creamy and bright.

When it comes to cooking the pasta itself, we must be mindful of its texture and temperature. Linguine should always be cooked al dente, meaning that it still has a slight bite or chewiness to it. This is crucial in preventing the noodles from becoming mushy and overcooked, which can lead to a loss of flavor and texture.

As we cook the pasta, we add the clams - usually 12 per person, depending on size and appetite. These delicate shellfish are cooked until they're tender and slightly browned, then pulled out of their shells just before serving. The result is a dish that's both elegant and comforting, perfect for a night in with friends or family.

The secret to creating the perfect Linguini lies in the balance between flavors and textures. We must be careful not to overpower the delicate taste of the clams, while also ensuring that the pasta absorbs all the delicious flavors of the broth. This requires patience, attention to detail, and a willingness to experiment until we get it just right.

In this article, we'll delve into the world of Italian pasta-making, exploring the art of creating perfect Linguini with clams. We'll cover topics such as cooking techniques, ingredient selection, and presentation ideas - all designed to help you create a dish that's both delicious and memorable.

As we journey through the world of pasta, we'll encounter various ingredients and techniques that can elevate or detract from our dish. From garlic and lemon juice to herbs and spices, every component plays a vital role in creating a flavorful and satisfying Linguini with clams.

Throughout this article, we'll also touch on presentation ideas - how to arrange the pasta and clams in a way that's both visually appealing and Instagram-worthy. With these tips and tricks, you'll be well on your way to creating a dish that's not only delicious but also stunning.

Whether you're a seasoned chef or a culinary newbie, this article is designed for anyone looking to improve their pasta-making skills and create the perfect Linguini with clams. So let's get started - in the world of Italian pasta, there's always room for learning and improvement!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhey everyone I'm Antonia lefaso and welcome to my home we are literally cooking in my home today I'm excited to be doing this cook along with you guys we are going to be making Linguini and clams for the Feast of Seven Fishes so the Feast of Seven Fishes is an Italian American tradition that's celebrated on Christmas Eve the entire meal is basically made up of seafood dishes and I have to say the Feast of seven fish is not complete unless you have a pasta dish and who doesn't love a ton of clams with a ton of butter lemon parsley and white wine so a couple of housekeeping tips before we start I want to make sure that you have your Manila clams all cleaned and washed so a tip for you guys I love to become friends with my local fishmonger butcher and produce manager in your Supermarket remember that all of these supermarkets purchased from the same pveers that restaurants do so any any kind of specialty ingredient that you're asking for or asking for it to be f fabricated or cleaned like the clams they will do that for you you just have to ask also make sure that you get a large pot on to boil a pound of pasta we want to make sure that we don't break the pasta so make sure your pot is large enough to hold an entire pound of Linguini so we're going to start by just chopping a whole bunch of garlic uh and we're also going to chop some Italian parsley and that's going to be the basis of our Linguini and clams so you can absolutely buy your garlic already peeled and that'll make it a little bit easier um I'm only making a couple of portions today so for me I kind of find garlic peeling relaxing you know there's just this kind of relaxing feeling of just kind of pressing on garlic and then peeling it and not necessarily being in a rush right so we'll start with that and see how much it gets us but peeled garlic is 100% legal don't feel like you're cheating it and what I do is I kind of just hold all my garlic that's unpeeled on one corner pull them out kind of press it with the base of my hand pull and then press pull press and then push so that I know this side is where I'm going to start peeling from the last thing we need to do is get confused and have half uh pressed garlic and unpressed garlic and then you got to go and do it so it's about being organized even when working on your cutting board okay so there's a lot of different tricks to the trade on how to peel garlic but I find just the oldfashioned way where you just kind of press it peel it separate the garlic there's just something relaxing about it and then also the holidays you know cooking doesn't have to be a stressful task where you get really excited and and then all of a sudden it's like oh my goodness there's so much to do just relax you know you can open a bottle of wine you can have an appol Spritz or even just a sparkling water and just know that this time of year is just a time for you to relax maybe learn a new recipe maybe explore um a recipe that you never thought that you would do um and just kind of you know lean into it I guess I would say just lean into it and don't take it all so seriously at the end of the day it's just cooking and we're here to enjoy ourselves I love how the garlic smells oh it's my favorite thing in the world my mom would start cooking for Christmas dinner the Feast of the seven fish sometimes five or six days in advance she have an entire menu plot for I don't know 3 or 4 days where she would be like okay this is what we're going to have on Christmas Eve this is what we're going to have on Christmas day she would send out little emails and text messages and you know let everyone know what the entire day was going to consist of and it was like this um this little note of love that we got where it was like H I know on Christmas Eve when I walk through that door I'm going to be so excited to eat all of my favorite dishes and sometimes she got a little creative and decided to do um to really experiment that was always fun sometimes experiments work sometimes they don't but either way there's always like a really fun story for it okay so I've got all of my garlic peeled and I'm just going to get ready to chop it now there's all these kind of little stems and sort of the root of the garlic that a lot of people will tell you this matters and that you should peel it off I don't really it doesn't bother me it really doesn't especially when we're cooking at home like listen we're going to chop all this garlic the root is going to get chopped in there no one's really going to notice it unless it's really discolored or uh large that I will remove it but I'm not going to go through every single piece of garlic to remove it it is a practice that we do inside restaurants but you know that's just a fine dining technique I really don't think that it matters and if you're chopping this pretty fine no one's going to find it um all right so a little bit of chopping chopping chopping 101 I like to kind of put all of my garlic after I've got it into a rough chop kind of into this little I don't know Square rectangle ball whatever happens hand on the top of my knife my other hand at the base of my knife I'm kind of holding it end to endend and I just go over the top very very gently bring it back over the top bring everything back over the top bring everything back you want to make sure that there's all of a sudden not pieces of garlic all over your cutting board you want to keep it close to you and you just want to bring your knife in a rocking motion back and forth okay so garlic just kind of off to the side of my cutting board off to the side of my cutting board all right people let's talk about clams now like I said earlier they should already be cleaned and washed for you but but that doesn't mean when you get home that you just kind of leave them be it means that the initial rinse has been done the initial scrubbing has been done and we hope that all of the sand has dislodged from the shells that being said you do want to go through your clams to make sure that none of them are cracked if any of them are cracked immediately just throw them away it's okay if they're open right now we want to run them over some water put a little bit of salt on them the friction of that water in a bowl and your hand mixing through the water the clams then sort of rub into each other dislodging any sand that they may be holding on to so we don't get any grit inside of our Linguini and clams so I'm going to put these back into the sink I'm going to rinse them with a little bit of water pour some salt over the top give them a little bit of massage to get any kind of sand off them and then we'll start so you can just stick them in a bowl with some water and then underneath you're just kind of mixing them together and I want you to be able to see this and that's why I'm doing doing it on the countertop when you're in the sink you can be a little bit more aggressive with it but the more aggressive that you are the more these clams are going to uh kind of rub up against each other and dislodge any of those sand particles and at this point too once the clam is back into water and has a little salt on it they'll close they'll close if they're still alive okay if you see any in here that are open okay I sometimes give them a little tap I'll start squeezing them all of these are nice and closed which is great um but I'll give them like a little bit of a squeeze and if they close just from that prompt to close then they're good it means they're still alive if you're squeezing on it and they're not closing they're dead and you should throw them away so we've got the chopped garlic we've got cleaned clams I've got a little bit of a high mineral white wine like a CH some olive oil we're going to finish with lemon juice and I have my Italian pars that we're going to chop but we can start the cooking process now okay pasta cooking so I've got my pasta at a perfect rolling boil I'm going to season heavily with some kosher salt I'm going to let that come back up to a boil all that salt falls to the bottom of the pot so we're going to give it a little stir and make sure all of that salt is incorporated before I taste it because we may miss something perfect Pasta in oh look at that you want to try and find a pan that has an opportunity just like you saw where the pasta was submerged right away so I'm moving the Linguini very gently in the water creating a Whirlpool so that it doesn't stick together I'm not a believer of putting oil in my pasta water to prevent it from sticking I will use a little oil outside to make sure it doesn't stick right before it goes into a pasta sauce but not when it's cooking I don't think I don't see any need for it um but what I am doing is creating my own little whirlpool in there and we're going to pull this pasta out when there's still four to five minutes left of cooking because I want to cook that pasta in all of this incredible sauce that we're about to make so I'm heating a very large sauté pan and I'm going to do a mixture of olive oil and butter the butter is for flavor and for emulsification the oil will do the same as well but really there is this thing that happens with oil and butter that I just think is so good like the olive oil has flavor the butter is creaminess it's a good little mixture the other thing too is that if you were just doing it with butter the butter tends to Brown a lot faster and when you add a little bit of olive oil to the butter it prolongs the Browning process so it gives our garlic an opportunity to really get nice and translucent in there and I'm going to do about three sprigs of parsley hole and that's just to season the oil okay and the butter so we've got oil butter garlic parsley and this is the base for our sauce for our clamp CLS now clams are basically have their own natural broth it's inside as soon as they start to open they're going to release all of their beautiful juice and that along with the butter the olive oil the garlic and the white wine is going to create our sauce for Linguini and clams okay so and we just want the garlic to start to open up to bloom I don't want to see any Browning I don't want to see any sort of crisping I just want to see translucent and you want to just smell the garlic melting into the butter and the olive oil so again the olive oil acts as sort of uh the longevity to the butter the butter tends to Brown very very quickly so when it's mixed with olive oil it won't Brown as quickly we've got pasta going I don't want it to cook too much I'm actually going to pull it out only a second 3/4 of the way okay so that we can spend so much time cooking it inside of this broth it's great oh smells so good okay going in and we're just going to let those guys sit in there okay I'm not adding any salt yet I'm waiting on the salt because all clams or whatever clam you're using or possibly a cockal all of them have different Salen levels depending on where they were harvested what time of year it is so many things so I wait to taste the clam I wait to taste the sauce before I add any salt just to this application so let those go I'm going to pull my pasta out into the colander now and I know it's only been cooking a couple minutes I'd rather it harder than softer we can't go back so pasta is coming off and just going right into a Colum if you've learned anything today from me holding on to your pasta water comes in handy you can see that there so the pasta is still nice and hard it's in the colander and I just just going to let it sit in the sink in the colander steaming I'm going to add a little touch of olive oil to it so that it doesn't stick together and then we'll finish our sauce and add everything together okay so I don't like to move the clams that much in the pot okay I want to give them an opportunity to open up on their own before I add the wine and I'm going to add the wine right now now everyone has their measurement at home I'm the professional in this situation so I'm just going to eyeball it don't worry and as these clams open up I'm just going to start pulling them out so that they don't overcook and come out of their shell so once they open up they've done what I need them to do for the sauce which is release all of their natural juice and all of their natural salinity and now we're going to basically make sure that they don't overcook and that we can continue cooking the sauce down to the right consistency and we can also continue cooking the pasta inside of the sauce so I will use tongs to pull them out individually at first and then as they all start to open I can grab a slotted spoon and grab them out in larger numbers um let's see but the object of the game aim here is to get all the clams open at the same time all of that wine has cooked out so that we have just a beautiful reduced wine with all of that natural clam juice and the butter now I always like to say if you give the clams a little bit of help right a little knock on their door you rotate your hand a little bit and start to move them it helps them start to open up they're on the verge of opening up and then as soon as you give them a little a little uh shake a little jolt then they really start to open up and I'm always like so impressed by the last one standing you know they start to open and then there's just one clam or two clams in there that's like I'm not doing it I'm not opening I'm not going to do it and then obviously you got to throw that away but before I decide to throw away the stubborn clam that won't open up I do a little like knock on his door right you open you're going to open what's going on you guys are going to open sometimes you give him a little tap tap you know they're fine with it see come on last little clams let's go sometimes you got to submerge them a little bit more right look at this last little seven don't want to go it's like they're a little crew they're like we're not going to do it come on people there they go come on you know you want to I mean I want these clams on my team they're like not giving up the ship for anything right now these last little five four more to go let's go I'm just removing those stems of parsley there's little pieces of parsley that came off the stem into the sauce that's great we will keep that two two last little Fighters they won't come out stubborn little suckers there you go there you go buddy I'm not giving up no clam Left Behind let's go sometimes I think it helps right there there we go okay so I'm going to lower that we're going to add a little bit more butter so it can thicken up now this is where holding on to your pasta sauce comes in handy we're going to taste the broth we're going to make sure that all of that white wine has been cooked out the seasoning is correct when it comes to Salt uh we're going to add lemon juice at the end add a little bit more butter to emulsify the entire sauce and we're going to add our pasta back into that sauce and let it cook I need no salt that's how delicious and that's how much salinity is in those clams no salt is needed so now I'm going to take my pasta my Linguini that still has a little bit of steam coming off of it it's been oiled okay it's not overcooked see there's still like a nice Bend to it and we're going to throw it right into the Linguini sauce now if you've learned anything today from me it's two things salt your pasta water and cook your pasta inside of the sauce that's what makes it delicious noodles are like sponges macaroni is like sponges we want the sauce the pasta wants the sauce H all of the flex of garlic that are going through we're going to let this cook for about 2 or 3 minutes we're going to finish it with some lemon juice some chopped parsley and we are good to go let's try those noodles still all Dente got a little bit of water so good okay let's chop some parsley and get that lemon to squeeze so Italian parsley or flat leaf parsley wouldn't use a curly parsley in this application um I would definitely only use a flat leaf Italians do call it Italian and what I like to do is just pull the parsley roll The Parsley little bit of stem doesn't make me angry okay we can pull these these pieces off but we can use these for brazes the stem piece we can use them for Soups you can use them for stocks we just want the leaf here a little bit of stem is not going to hurt anybody though and we're going to go with a rough chop okay doesn't need to be perfect run our knife over it three or four times just make sure there's no large pieces of stem if you see some large pieces in stem in there you can pull them out d D going to cut this lemon going to just finish with a little bit of lemon inside of that pasta one more squeeze and there's just so much butter and so much garlic in this noodle which is great but it needs a little bit of freshness right the high mineral White white wine brings it but then the lemon juice really takes it over the edge going to finish with all of that chopped parsley right onto my knife and into the pan and then it's just about bringing it together right the lemon juice The Parsley all of the broth and I like to use tongs in this application I try not to break up the noodle too much the Linguini too much and that's just kind of grabbing from the outside bringing it in mixing it flipping it whatever feels comfortable just making sure that all of that noodle all of that liquid all of that great sauce was absorbed by the pasta let's plate this bad boy shall we oh I know people like a good cheese pool I like a good pasta pool right there in the center just like that then all those clams perfectly cooked and still in their shell I like to say about 12 clams per person right that seems like a fair number and just kind of put them all over right if you happen to eat one on the way who's telling so good then just to finish just take some fresh parsley over the top just kind of pick it and again it's such an easy dish but strong technique a good amount of strong technique that goes into it all right I have a very specific way of eating Linguini and clams I love it served in the Shell but then I like to pull all the clams out before I start so that I can really just enjoy right so definitely this is for the presentation of it but when I get into it I just want to eat all of the clams in the pasta and I don't want to be disturbed right and then I get in there right and there's nothing precious about this dish you go for it what you don't do do though is cut your spaghetti okay you got to roll your spaghetti and you got to know that this is going to be a big bite and that's okay there's going to be noodles that come out and the right way is to bite whatever doesn't make it you just bite and let it fall that's okay I've seen beautiful Italian women all over Italy doing it they have no shame and neither do Ihey everyone I'm Antonia lefaso and welcome to my home we are literally cooking in my home today I'm excited to be doing this cook along with you guys we are going to be making Linguini and clams for the Feast of Seven Fishes so the Feast of Seven Fishes is an Italian American tradition that's celebrated on Christmas Eve the entire meal is basically made up of seafood dishes and I have to say the Feast of seven fish is not complete unless you have a pasta dish and who doesn't love a ton of clams with a ton of butter lemon parsley and white wine so a couple of housekeeping tips before we start I want to make sure that you have your Manila clams all cleaned and washed so a tip for you guys I love to become friends with my local fishmonger butcher and produce manager in your Supermarket remember that all of these supermarkets purchased from the same pveers that restaurants do so any any kind of specialty ingredient that you're asking for or asking for it to be f fabricated or cleaned like the clams they will do that for you you just have to ask also make sure that you get a large pot on to boil a pound of pasta we want to make sure that we don't break the pasta so make sure your pot is large enough to hold an entire pound of Linguini so we're going to start by just chopping a whole bunch of garlic uh and we're also going to chop some Italian parsley and that's going to be the basis of our Linguini and clams so you can absolutely buy your garlic already peeled and that'll make it a little bit easier um I'm only making a couple of portions today so for me I kind of find garlic peeling relaxing you know there's just this kind of relaxing feeling of just kind of pressing on garlic and then peeling it and not necessarily being in a rush right so we'll start with that and see how much it gets us but peeled garlic is 100% legal don't feel like you're cheating it and what I do is I kind of just hold all my garlic that's unpeeled on one corner pull them out kind of press it with the base of my hand pull and then press pull press and then push so that I know this side is where I'm going to start peeling from the last thing we need to do is get confused and have half uh pressed garlic and unpressed garlic and then you got to go and do it so it's about being organized even when working on your cutting board okay so there's a lot of different tricks to the trade on how to peel garlic but I find just the oldfashioned way where you just kind of press it peel it separate the garlic there's just something relaxing about it and then also the holidays you know cooking doesn't have to be a stressful task where you get really excited and and then all of a sudden it's like oh my goodness there's so much to do just relax you know you can open a bottle of wine you can have an appol Spritz or even just a sparkling water and just know that this time of year is just a time for you to relax maybe learn a new recipe maybe explore um a recipe that you never thought that you would do um and just kind of you know lean into it I guess I would say just lean into it and don't take it all so seriously at the end of the day it's just cooking and we're here to enjoy ourselves I love how the garlic smells oh it's my favorite thing in the world my mom would start cooking for Christmas dinner the Feast of the seven fish sometimes five or six days in advance she have an entire menu plot for I don't know 3 or 4 days where she would be like okay this is what we're going to have on Christmas Eve this is what we're going to have on Christmas day she would send out little emails and text messages and you know let everyone know what the entire day was going to consist of and it was like this um this little note of love that we got where it was like H I know on Christmas Eve when I walk through that door I'm going to be so excited to eat all of my favorite dishes and sometimes she got a little creative and decided to do um to really experiment that was always fun sometimes experiments work sometimes they don't but either way there's always like a really fun story for it okay so I've got all of my garlic peeled and I'm just going to get ready to chop it now there's all these kind of little stems and sort of the root of the garlic that a lot of people will tell you this matters and that you should peel it off I don't really it doesn't bother me it really doesn't especially when we're cooking at home like listen we're going to chop all this garlic the root is going to get chopped in there no one's really going to notice it unless it's really discolored or uh large that I will remove it but I'm not going to go through every single piece of garlic to remove it it is a practice that we do inside restaurants but you know that's just a fine dining technique I really don't think that it matters and if you're chopping this pretty fine no one's going to find it um all right so a little bit of chopping chopping chopping 101 I like to kind of put all of my garlic after I've got it into a rough chop kind of into this little I don't know Square rectangle ball whatever happens hand on the top of my knife my other hand at the base of my knife I'm kind of holding it end to endend and I just go over the top very very gently bring it back over the top bring everything back over the top bring everything back you want to make sure that there's all of a sudden not pieces of garlic all over your cutting board you want to keep it close to you and you just want to bring your knife in a rocking motion back and forth okay so garlic just kind of off to the side of my cutting board off to the side of my cutting board all right people let's talk about clams now like I said earlier they should already be cleaned and washed for you but but that doesn't mean when you get home that you just kind of leave them be it means that the initial rinse has been done the initial scrubbing has been done and we hope that all of the sand has dislodged from the shells that being said you do want to go through your clams to make sure that none of them are cracked if any of them are cracked immediately just throw them away it's okay if they're open right now we want to run them over some water put a little bit of salt on them the friction of that water in a bowl and your hand mixing through the water the clams then sort of rub into each other dislodging any sand that they may be holding on to so we don't get any grit inside of our Linguini and clams so I'm going to put these back into the sink I'm going to rinse them with a little bit of water pour some salt over the top give them a little bit of massage to get any kind of sand off them and then we'll start so you can just stick them in a bowl with some water and then underneath you're just kind of mixing them together and I want you to be able to see this and that's why I'm doing doing it on the countertop when you're in the sink you can be a little bit more aggressive with it but the more aggressive that you are the more these clams are going to uh kind of rub up against each other and dislodge any of those sand particles and at this point too once the clam is back into water and has a little salt on it they'll close they'll close if they're still alive okay if you see any in here that are open okay I sometimes give them a little tap I'll start squeezing them all of these are nice and closed which is great um but I'll give them like a little bit of a squeeze and if they close just from that prompt to close then they're good it means they're still alive if you're squeezing on it and they're not closing they're dead and you should throw them away so we've got the chopped garlic we've got cleaned clams I've got a little bit of a high mineral white wine like a CH some olive oil we're going to finish with lemon juice and I have my Italian pars that we're going to chop but we can start the cooking process now okay pasta cooking so I've got my pasta at a perfect rolling boil I'm going to season heavily with some kosher salt I'm going to let that come back up to a boil all that salt falls to the bottom of the pot so we're going to give it a little stir and make sure all of that salt is incorporated before I taste it because we may miss something perfect Pasta in oh look at that you want to try and find a pan that has an opportunity just like you saw where the pasta was submerged right away so I'm moving the Linguini very gently in the water creating a Whirlpool so that it doesn't stick together I'm not a believer of putting oil in my pasta water to prevent it from sticking I will use a little oil outside to make sure it doesn't stick right before it goes into a pasta sauce but not when it's cooking I don't think I don't see any need for it um but what I am doing is creating my own little whirlpool in there and we're going to pull this pasta out when there's still four to five minutes left of cooking because I want to cook that pasta in all of this incredible sauce that we're about to make so I'm heating a very large sauté pan and I'm going to do a mixture of olive oil and butter the butter is for flavor and for emulsification the oil will do the same as well but really there is this thing that happens with oil and butter that I just think is so good like the olive oil has flavor the butter is creaminess it's a good little mixture the other thing too is that if you were just doing it with butter the butter tends to Brown a lot faster and when you add a little bit of olive oil to the butter it prolongs the Browning process so it gives our garlic an opportunity to really get nice and translucent in there and I'm going to do about three sprigs of parsley hole and that's just to season the oil okay and the butter so we've got oil butter garlic parsley and this is the base for our sauce for our clamp CLS now clams are basically have their own natural broth it's inside as soon as they start to open they're going to release all of their beautiful juice and that along with the butter the olive oil the garlic and the white wine is going to create our sauce for Linguini and clams okay so and we just want the garlic to start to open up to bloom I don't want to see any Browning I don't want to see any sort of crisping I just want to see translucent and you want to just smell the garlic melting into the butter and the olive oil so again the olive oil acts as sort of uh the longevity to the butter the butter tends to Brown very very quickly so when it's mixed with olive oil it won't Brown as quickly we've got pasta going I don't want it to cook too much I'm actually going to pull it out only a second 3/4 of the way okay so that we can spend so much time cooking it inside of this broth it's great oh smells so good okay going in and we're just going to let those guys sit in there okay I'm not adding any salt yet I'm waiting on the salt because all clams or whatever clam you're using or possibly a cockal all of them have different Salen levels depending on where they were harvested what time of year it is so many things so I wait to taste the clam I wait to taste the sauce before I add any salt just to this application so let those go I'm going to pull my pasta out into the colander now and I know it's only been cooking a couple minutes I'd rather it harder than softer we can't go back so pasta is coming off and just going right into a Colum if you've learned anything today from me holding on to your pasta water comes in handy you can see that there so the pasta is still nice and hard it's in the colander and I just just going to let it sit in the sink in the colander steaming I'm going to add a little touch of olive oil to it so that it doesn't stick together and then we'll finish our sauce and add everything together okay so I don't like to move the clams that much in the pot okay I want to give them an opportunity to open up on their own before I add the wine and I'm going to add the wine right now now everyone has their measurement at home I'm the professional in this situation so I'm just going to eyeball it don't worry and as these clams open up I'm just going to start pulling them out so that they don't overcook and come out of their shell so once they open up they've done what I need them to do for the sauce which is release all of their natural juice and all of their natural salinity and now we're going to basically make sure that they don't overcook and that we can continue cooking the sauce down to the right consistency and we can also continue cooking the pasta inside of the sauce so I will use tongs to pull them out individually at first and then as they all start to open I can grab a slotted spoon and grab them out in larger numbers um let's see but the object of the game aim here is to get all the clams open at the same time all of that wine has cooked out so that we have just a beautiful reduced wine with all of that natural clam juice and the butter now I always like to say if you give the clams a little bit of help right a little knock on their door you rotate your hand a little bit and start to move them it helps them start to open up they're on the verge of opening up and then as soon as you give them a little a little uh shake a little jolt then they really start to open up and I'm always like so impressed by the last one standing you know they start to open and then there's just one clam or two clams in there that's like I'm not doing it I'm not opening I'm not going to do it and then obviously you got to throw that away but before I decide to throw away the stubborn clam that won't open up I do a little like knock on his door right you open you're going to open what's going on you guys are going to open sometimes you give him a little tap tap you know they're fine with it see come on last little clams let's go sometimes you got to submerge them a little bit more right look at this last little seven don't want to go it's like they're a little crew they're like we're not going to do it come on people there they go come on you know you want to I mean I want these clams on my team they're like not giving up the ship for anything right now these last little five four more to go let's go I'm just removing those stems of parsley there's little pieces of parsley that came off the stem into the sauce that's great we will keep that two two last little Fighters they won't come out stubborn little suckers there you go there you go buddy I'm not giving up no clam Left Behind let's go sometimes I think it helps right there there we go okay so I'm going to lower that we're going to add a little bit more butter so it can thicken up now this is where holding on to your pasta sauce comes in handy we're going to taste the broth we're going to make sure that all of that white wine has been cooked out the seasoning is correct when it comes to Salt uh we're going to add lemon juice at the end add a little bit more butter to emulsify the entire sauce and we're going to add our pasta back into that sauce and let it cook I need no salt that's how delicious and that's how much salinity is in those clams no salt is needed so now I'm going to take my pasta my Linguini that still has a little bit of steam coming off of it it's been oiled okay it's not overcooked see there's still like a nice Bend to it and we're going to throw it right into the Linguini sauce now if you've learned anything today from me it's two things salt your pasta water and cook your pasta inside of the sauce that's what makes it delicious noodles are like sponges macaroni is like sponges we want the sauce the pasta wants the sauce H all of the flex of garlic that are going through we're going to let this cook for about 2 or 3 minutes we're going to finish it with some lemon juice some chopped parsley and we are good to go let's try those noodles still all Dente got a little bit of water so good okay let's chop some parsley and get that lemon to squeeze so Italian parsley or flat leaf parsley wouldn't use a curly parsley in this application um I would definitely only use a flat leaf Italians do call it Italian and what I like to do is just pull the parsley roll The Parsley little bit of stem doesn't make me angry okay we can pull these these pieces off but we can use these for brazes the stem piece we can use them for Soups you can use them for stocks we just want the leaf here a little bit of stem is not going to hurt anybody though and we're going to go with a rough chop okay doesn't need to be perfect run our knife over it three or four times just make sure there's no large pieces of stem if you see some large pieces in stem in there you can pull them out d D going to cut this lemon going to just finish with a little bit of lemon inside of that pasta one more squeeze and there's just so much butter and so much garlic in this noodle which is great but it needs a little bit of freshness right the high mineral White white wine brings it but then the lemon juice really takes it over the edge going to finish with all of that chopped parsley right onto my knife and into the pan and then it's just about bringing it together right the lemon juice The Parsley all of the broth and I like to use tongs in this application I try not to break up the noodle too much the Linguini too much and that's just kind of grabbing from the outside bringing it in mixing it flipping it whatever feels comfortable just making sure that all of that noodle all of that liquid all of that great sauce was absorbed by the pasta let's plate this bad boy shall we oh I know people like a good cheese pool I like a good pasta pool right there in the center just like that then all those clams perfectly cooked and still in their shell I like to say about 12 clams per person right that seems like a fair number and just kind of put them all over right if you happen to eat one on the way who's telling so good then just to finish just take some fresh parsley over the top just kind of pick it and again it's such an easy dish but strong technique a good amount of strong technique that goes into it all right I have a very specific way of eating Linguini and clams I love it served in the Shell but then I like to pull all the clams out before I start so that I can really just enjoy right so definitely this is for the presentation of it but when I get into it I just want to eat all of the clams in the pasta and I don't want to be disturbed right and then I get in there right and there's nothing precious about this dish you go for it what you don't do do though is cut your spaghetti okay you got to roll your spaghetti and you got to know that this is going to be a big bite and that's okay there's going to be noodles that come out and the right way is to bite whatever doesn't make it you just bite and let it fall that's okay I've seen beautiful Italian women all over Italy doing it they have no shame and neither do I\n"