Linguine with Fresh Clam Sauce

When I go out to eat at an Italian restaurant, one of the first things I look for is linguine with clam sauce. I’ve always loved this dish – I still remember going to Little Italy in New York with my family when I was a kid and ordering this dish. It always feels like such a treat and something that you might not want to cook at home. Clams are somehow so intimidating! But it turns out, they are INCREDIBLY easy to make at home. You just have to clean them properly. There’s lots of mixed advice on the internet on how to do this. Some say that if you even touch your clams with fresh water, they will die. Others advise you to soak them in fresh water for 30 minutes. So who do you trust? Both can’t possibly be true! This can be so stressful for someone making clams for the first time. The last thing you want is sandy clams and you don’t want to start out making your dinner being unnecessarily stressed out.

Cleaning the Clams

So I will tell you what I did and what I know works! As soon as you get home from buying your clams, you want to inspect them so you can remove any dead clams from the batch. Clams should be tightly closed – if a clam is open, you want to gently tap the outside of the shell. The clam should quickly close. If it does not close, the clam is dead. Throw that sucker away. You also want to throw away any clams that have broken shells. Once you have sifted through the clams to make sure you only have live ones left, you are ready to clean!

You will need two large bowls that are big enough to fit all of your clams without overcrowding them too much and a clean hard bristle brush to scrub them with. Fill both bowls with COLD water and add some salt to mimic sea water. Place all of the clams in the first bowl and let them soak for 30 minutes. You want them to purge the sand that is inside of the shells, as well as remove it from the outside. You will notice that very quickly this water gets quite dirty. That’s why we are going to move the clams around every 30 minutes, instead of letting them soak in the same bowl for longer.

After 30 minutes in the first bowl of cold salt water, you are going to scrub the outsides of the shells and then transfer them to your next bowl with cold salt water. Use your hard bristle brush to scrub the outsides of the clams to remove all of the sand. You’ll want to scrub them pretty well to remove all of the dirt, cleaning your brush as needed with water so you are always working with a clean brush. Once the clams are scrubbed, transfer them to the second bowl with cold salt water and let them soak again for 30 minutes. While these are soaking, clean out your first bowl. You want to get all of the sand out of the bowl so you can use it for your last soak. Refill that bowl with cold water and add your salt. After 30 minutes in the second bowl, transfer to the third bowl for your last soak. Make sure you are picking your clams up and placing them in the bowls to minimize the amount of sand you transfer with them. After they have finished soaking in their third and final bowl, scrub them one last time and transfer them to a clean empty bowl. They are ready to use, but you can cover them with a damp paper towel and place them in your fridge until you are ready to use them. Use within 24 hours for the freshest tasting clams.

Making Your Pasta (if you want!)

I love making fresh pasta, it really makes whatever you are cooking up feel extra special and like its straight from a restaurant kitchen. But there’s some awesome dried pastas out there so absolutely don’t feel compelled to make fresh pasta at home. But if you wanted to, here’s a super easy recipe to make pasta dough by hand. Typically, I make pasta with a combination of 00 and semolina flours. But it’s been really hard to find just about any type of flour at grocery stores lately due to COVID. So I used just AP flour for this recipe, since I know if there’s any flour there’s a chance you might have at home, it’s probably AP.

Your first step is going to be creating a large well of flour so you can put your liquids in the center, as seen in the photos below. I have also included all of these instructional photos in the recipe, as well, so it’s easy to see as you walk through the steps. Using a fork, you are going to slowly whisk together the eggs in the center of the well and then slowly start incorporating the flour from the well. Be careful not to take the flour from the top of the well walls, you don’t want your liquids to go all over the place. Once the liquid mixture is thick enough that it won’t spill all over your work surface, set your fork aside and get those hands dirty! Use your hands to cover the liquid mixture with the rest of the flour and mix until combined into a sticky dough. Once you have a dough formed (like the third image below) start kneading the dough until it forms a smooth, round ball. To knead the dough, hold the front of the dough closest to you and use your other hand to pull the other end away from you. Then fold dough in half back towards the front edge, rotate 90 degrees, and continue.

Once your dough is formed, cut it into 4 equal pieces and wrap tightly in plastic wrap. Then let it rest at room temperature for at least an hour to relax the dough. Then you can roll the dough out either using a rolling pin or a pasta roller to your desired thickness. For linguine, I use setting 6 on my KitchenAid pasta roller attachment. You can then slice the linguine by hand or use a pasta cutter to create your linguine. Make sure to coat your pasta in flour as you are rolling it if it gets sticky at all. And always coat your cut pasta with flour so the noodles don’t stick together.

Fresh pasta, especially when its this thin, cooks extremely quickly. Like less than a minute, basically 30 seconds, quickly! So you’ll set this aside until you are ready to serve. You’ll make your clam sauce and get everything ready and then at the last minute, you’ll cook your pasta and then toss with your sauce. You can leave the pasta out for awhile, it’s fine if it dries out a bit. Then it’s like cooking dried pasta! So definitely feel free to make your pasta in the morning and let it hang out until you are ready for dinner. I always test one noodle before I cook the whole batch so I know how long it takes to get perfectly cooked pasta. If you let it dry longer or roll it a bit thicker, it might need more time. So I always like to do a test.

Making your Clam Sauce

Now you are on to the easiest part of the whole recipe, making the actual clam sauce! Seriously – this could not be easier. The toughest part is choosing the right size pot or Dutch oven to use! Make sure you are using a pot that is big enough to fit all of your clams (and eventually your pasta) but not SO big that your liquid won’t cover most of your clams. I use my oval Le Creuset 4.25qt (#27) Dutch oven for this dish. So anything similar in size will work!

Then all you have to do is cook down your shallots and garlic until softened and fragrant, add your clams, and cover with white wine, parsley, red pepper flakes, and salt, and steam them until they are opened! This will take about 8 minutes. Any clams that are not opening aren’t good, so throw those ones away. While you wait for your clams to open, pour some of that wine in a glass for yourself. Use a wine that you would want to drink so you can enjoy the fruits of the your labor with a nice glass of wine. Once they are open, I like to keep some clams in their shell for serving, but then I take the rest out and chop them up to add to the sauce. Much easier to eat! I add the chopped up clams back to the sauce and cook my pasta super quickly. Then you just add your cooked pasta in your sauce, plus some parsley, lemon zest, lemon juice, and some butter. I like to use tongs to bring my pasta into my sauce so I get some of the pasta water too. If you prefer to use a colander to strain your pasta, make sure you reserve about a 1/4 cup of pasta water to add to your sauce. That will help thicken it and make sure it sticks to your pasta. Then serve!! So easy!

Print Recipe

Linguine with Fresh Clam Sauce

This recipe uses fresh clams to make a restaurant style clam sauce at home. Clams may seem intimidating but they are actually so easy to make at home!

Prep Time1 hour hr 30 minutes mins

Cook Time20 minutes mins

Course: Main Course

Cuisine: Italian

Keyword: clam sauce, fresh clams, linguine

Ingredients

For the clam sauce:

• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 2 medium shallots diced
• 4 large cloves garlic minced
• 3 lbs fresh clams (like littlenecks) cleaned and scrubbed, instructions in the blog post (The clams I get are pretty big so this is about 30 clams.)
• 1.5 cups dry white wine use a wine that you would drink!
• 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
• 3/4 tsp kosher salt
• 1/4 cup parsley, plus 2 tbsp finely chopped
• Zest of one lemon
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• 4 tbsp unsalted butter cubed

For fresh pasta (or you can just use 1.5lb of dried pasta!):

• 1 lb all-purpose flour
• 5 large whole eggs
• Pinch of salt
• 1 tbsp olive oil

Instructions

For the pasta:

• Pour all of the flour out onto a clean, dry surface and form the flour into a large circle. Use your hands to form a well in the center of the circle. You want the well to be pretty large because you are going to fill it with the eggs, salt, and olive oil. Make sure the walls of your well are high enough so that the liquids won’t spill out.
• Crack the eggs directly into the center of the well (or you can crack them separately into a small bowl if you are worried about getting any shells in and then just pour the mix into the well).
  
• Add the salt and olive oil to the center of the well.
• Using a fork, slowly whisk the eggs together, gradually bringing some of the flour from the circle. Be careful not to take from the top of the walls of the flour well, or your eggs will overflow and get all over the place.
  
• Keep whisking the eggs, slowly adding more and more flour until the mix is thick enough that it won’t go everywhere.
• When you get to this point, use your hands to incorporate the rest of the flour.
  
• The dough should be slightly sticky but workable. It shouldn’t be sticking a lot to your hands or the surface you are working on. If the dough feels very sticky and is sticking to your hands, you can add a bit more flour. If the dough feels very dry, wet your hands with some water to knead.
• Continue kneading the dough until a smooth, round ball is formed. The easiest way to knead dough is to hold the part closest to you and slowly pull far side away from yourself. Then fold that piece over in half back towards you and meet the dough at the other edge. Turn 90 degrees and continue.
• Once a dough ball has formed, cut the dough into 4 equal size pieces and wrap each piece in plastic wrap. Let it rest at room temperature for at least one hour.
  
• Before you cook with clams, you want to make sure they are cleaned properly. While you wait for the pasta to rest, it’s a great time to clean your clams. Instructions are included in the blog post.
• Once the dough has rested, roll out the dough slightly on a lightly floured surface. You can continue to roll the dough by hand to your desired thickness, or you can use a pasta roller. If using a pasta roller, slowly work your way from the thickest to one of the thinnest settings. I go to setting 6 on my KitchenAid Pasta Roller attachment.
• Once the dough is rolled out to your desired thickness, you can cut the pasta with a knife to form linguine noodles, or use a pasta cutter. I use the Spaghetti KitchenAid Pasta Cutter attachment. If using this, place your rolled pasta through the cutter with your KitchenAid mixer on speed 7.
• Transfer your cut pasta to a pasta drier or to a parchment lined baking sheet. Continue until all of your pasta is cut. If at any point the pasta gets to sticky or is sticking together, sprinkle the pasta with a bit more flour. I find this especially helpful to do once the pasta is cut so none of the noodles stick together.
  
• Set all of your pasta aside while you make the clam sauce. Fresh pasta takes VERY little time to cook, especially when it is cut this thin. These noodles take about 30 seconds to cook. So you won’t put them in the boiling water until you are basically ready to serve.

For the clam sauce:

• In a large dutch oven or pot, heat your olive oil over medium high heat.
• When the oil is shimmering, add your shallot and garlic. Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently, until softened and fragrant.
• Carefully add your clams to the pot, taking care not to break any of the shells.
• Add the white wine, 1/4 cup parsley, red pepper flakes, and salt.
  
• Cover the pot for about 8 minutes, until your clams are opened. If any of them do not open, throw them away.
  
• While the pot is covered and clams are steaming, you are going to prepare to cook your pasta. In another large pot, bring salted water to a boil.
• After 8 minutes, lower the heat of the burner to low, and remove the clams from the pot. Set aside about 2 clams per plate to serve in their shell. Remove all of the other clams from their shells, discard the shells, and chop the clams.
• Add the chopped clams back to the sauce pot. Cover and cook your pasta until al dente.
  
• Once your pasta is cooked, again this should only take about 30 seconds if using the fresh pasta, use tongs to transfer your pasta directly to the pot with your sauce. This will make sure you get some of that pasta water in your sauce, as well.
• Add the lemon zest, lemon juice, 2 tbsp. parsley, and butter. Use your tongs to coat the pasta in your sauce and melt the butter completely.
  
• Serve immediately, topped with the clams in their shells that you set aside earlier.