Bottega - Michael Chiarello [46]
You can use either cherrystone or Manila clams. Manilas open faster than cherrystones, within about four minutes. If you don’t own a sauté pan large enough to hold a pound of pasta and a lot of clams, a big roasting pan set right on the burners of your stove will work in its place, or you can use a Dutch oven. Taste before adding any salt; the sausage has a good amount of salt and you may not need any extra.
Wine Pairing: Greco, Pinot Grigio, or Friuli Bianco
24 Manila or cherrystone clams (1 pound), scrubbed
¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
¼ cup sliced garlic
3 cups dry white wine
½ cup chopped fresh basil
¾ cup peeled and diced Calabrian sausage or any spicy salami or chorizo
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1½ pounds fresh egg pasta or store-bought, cut into tagliarini (1/3-inch-wide ribbons), or 1 pound dried tagliarini
½ cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
¼ cup late-harvest extra-virgin olive oil for tossing
Toss out any clams that aren’t tightly closed. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil over high heat.
Heat a large sauté pan, roasting pan, or Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add the olive oil and, when it’s hot, add the garlic. Sauté until the garlic is light brown. Immediately add the clams and cook until you hear them popping, no more than 1 to 2 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and pour in the wine.
Increase the heat to high, place the pan on the heat for just 30 seconds, then reduce the heat to medium-high. (If using cherrystone clams, you’ll need to cover the pan.) Using tongs, transfer the opened clams to a baking sheet. Shake the pan to redistribute the remaining closed clams. (If cooking cherrystone clams, lift the lid every 30 seconds or so and take out any opened clams.)
After 5 minutes, give any clam that has not opened a good tap with a pair of tongs or a metal spoon, and put it back in the liquid, cooking for another minute to see if it will open. Discard any clams that do not open. Increase the heat to high and bring the liquid to a boil, cooking for about 1 minute to reduce the liquid. Add any clam juice from the baking sheet to the pan, along with the basil, sausage, and black pepper.
Cook the pasta in the boiling water for about 6 minutes, or until not quite al dente, because you’ll finish cooking it in the pan used to cook the clams. (Again, the clock isn’t as important as tasting to tell when the pasta is ready.) Reserve 2 cups of the pasta water, then drain the pasta.
Add the pasta to the sauté pan and toss for 1 minute. Add the clams and the parsley and toss. If the pasta is dry, add ½ cup of the pasta water, or more if needed. Cook until the pasta is al dente, about 2 minutes more for fresh pasta or 3 to 4 more for dried. Taste to tell when the pasta is perfect. Toss with the late-harvest olive oil and serve right away.
The ABC’s of Pasta Making
The flour you use determines how supple your pasta dough will be. You can use all-purpose flour, but it’s better to seek out special flours developed just for pasta making. In Italy, flours are labeled by how finely they’re ground. Doppio zero (“double zero”) is super-fine flour, almost the consistency of talcum. (Flour also comes labeled as zero or uno.) See Resources for pasta flour.
Whether a pasta dough contains only flour and water or flour, water, egg yolks, and salt, choose the best of each ingredient. Seek out organic farm eggs with yolks that are a deep, vibrant yellow.
A pasta machine is necessary to make dough as thin and even as you need it to be. The good news is, you can buy a pasta machine for a lot less than you’d pay for tools that you have to plug in, like a food processor. If you find you love pasta making, you can check out pasta-making tools such as a ravioli cutter or the chitarra maker. Fashioned like a harp strung with wires, this very low-tech tool makes instant ribbons of a sheet of pasta when you press the dough against the strings.
The best pasta-making tools are your hands. I think there’s a real beauty in pasta rustica—sheets