Clams, Mussels and White Wine/Butter Sauce

I got to do my first experimenting in cooking AT SCHOOL. To feed to my classmates. So awesome.

Everyone's group but ours had to follow a recipe, then chef stopped by our table and said "do whatever you want. make it have pasta, clams and mussels." I believe our collective jaws dropped. After hemming and hawing over the recipe we were going to make, (should it be white wine? should it be cream?) we decided to rest on it. In the morning I showed up early and wandered into the library on a whim. Why it would take me 3 months to figure out that the best foodie library in town was in the damn culinary school, I have no idea. It was way better than walking into the Powell's food section.

I ended up finding a recipe to cook mussels in white wine. I wrote it shorthand (completely avoiding telling everyone that you were supposed to just use the wine for cooking the mussels instead of as a base for a sauce because I really didn't want a reduction of heavy cream as a sauce) and took it back to my group. They approved, but now I was stuck with the daunting task of figuring just how to make this into a sauce. When I disappeared into the adjoined kitchen with little more than a sauce pan, crawfish stock and some booze, I got a little bit of that high I used to get when you'd lie to your parents about something stupid. No, dad, I didn't borrow your power saw to cut the head off my brother's army men. Why would you think that? But it was more yeah, I know what I am doing with this half gallon of sauvignon blanc and a whisk.

Long story short. It worked out fantastic. I think I really have a knack for sauces. I'll give you the full breakdown below for what I did and write down notes for myself for ways to make it simpler in case I want to make it again. It was good enough I probably will some day.

First thing I did was set 1.5 cups seafood (mostly crawfish and shrimp) stock and 2 cups white wine to reduce in a sauce pan on the stove.

Next we sauteed up about three cups each mussels and clams (no shells) in a few ounces of butter, with minced shallots and garlic (feel free to be extravagant with the butter, it all gets added into the sauce anyways and the sauce is very buttery). As they are cook, clams and mussels release lots of moisture. When done, strain the juices from the pans through paper towels and into the sauce pan. (Put the clams and mussels in a bowl on ice to stop cooking) Continue reducing. The liquid from the pans is a nice milky color and gives lots of body to the sauce.

After about 20 minutes, add an ounce of minced shallots, a teaspoon of lemon zest, and let cook for another few minutes. When the sauce is done reducing, add enough minced parsley to make it definitely a factor in the sauce, I think I used maybe a half a cup (really don't remember). Then start swirling in chunks of raw butter (monter au beurre). Balance the sauce with about a lemon and a half squeezed into the sauce. Salt to taste. (Don't use salt until the very end because I lot of these ingredients are naturally very salty).

To finish, saute the clams and mussels (just to heat) in a small amount of butter. Toss the sauce with angel hair or small linguine, add the mollusks and salt to taste. Remember, the sauce will end up much thinner than thickened, roux-based, or cream sauces. That was a concern for members of our group (until the dish was assembled). This is a very flavorful sauce, and being a butter sauce, it only needs to coat the pasta, not have a pool of it sitting in the bottom. That is very unappetizing with thin sauces.

If I wanted to try this again and make it healthier, I would substitute the seafood stock for vegetable stock, only use butter to saute the mollusks and thicken with a cornstarch slurry. It would turn out much fishier and I would use less lemon and probably a few extra herbs to make it more "green" tasting, maybe saute up some mushrooms with it as well. I think it would require a lot of balancing to get it right.