Linguine With Clam Sauce

- Total Time
- 25 minutes
- Rating
- Comments
- Read comments
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Ingredients
- Kosher salt
- 1pound linguine or other long pasta, such as linguine fini or spaghetti
- ¼cup extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for serving (optional)
- 5garlic cloves, thinly sliced
- ½ to 1teaspoon red-pepper flakes
- ½teaspoon dried oregano
- ½cup dry vermouth or dry white wine
- 2(10-ounce) cans whole baby clams with their juices
- Black pepper
- 2tablespoons unsalted butter
- 2teaspoons lemon zest (from 1 to 2 lemons)
- ½cup chopped Italian parsley
- Lemon wedges, for serving (optional)
Preparation
- Step 1
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the pasta and cook according to package instructions until 2 minutes short of al dente (it will finish cooking in the sauce). Reserve ½ cup pasta water, then drain pasta.
- Step 2
While the pasta cooks, make your sauce: Heat the oil in a deep-sided 12-inch skillet over medium. Add the garlic, red-pepper flakes and oregano and cook until the garlic is pale golden, 1 to 2 minutes. Add the vermouth and simmer until reduced by half, 3 to 4 minutes. Stir in the clams with their juices and cook until just warmed through, 1 to 2 minutes more. Taste and season with salt and pepper as needed.
- Step 3
Add the cooked pasta directly to the skillet along with the butter and lemon zest and toss until the butter has melted and the pasta is glossy with sauce. If needed, add ¼ cup reserved pasta water. Stir in half the parsley.
- Step 4
Serve pasta topped with a drizzle of olive oil, if desired, and the remaining parsley. Serve lemon wedges alongside if you like.
Private Notes
Comments
Stir in the clams with their juices? No, no, a thousand times no! Add the juices, quickly heat to reduce by about half, remove from the heat and then add the clams.
I've been making a variation of this for 30 years. Absolutely delicious! I snagged my husband with it. Don't bother with the zest (too time consuming), just squeeze half a lemon into the sauce at the end and stir in with the parsley. I also prefer chopped canned clams to whole, and I just mix it all in a big serving bowl when the pasta is cooked.
The juice from the canned clams isn't great. I used jar clam sauce in place of the juice from the canned claims. Don't add the clams with the juice and reduce they will be rubbery and overcooked. I finish cooking my pasta in clam juice. I heat a jar of claim juice in the skillet then add the pasta to finish cooking for the last 4 minutes. The add the clams/olive oil garlic mixture, toss and enjoy. its is devine
Took the suggestion to add clam juice first and clams with the angel hair- but it needs more sauce if using angel hair or really more sauce in general. Next time I’ll add a bottle of clam juice and try chopped clams. Used baby clams this time, worked great! Would like to try toasted panko in there next time.
Almost exactly how I have been making it for some 30 years! I use white pepper.
I added cooked bacon just before the last bit of time in the skillet. Made the dish, in my view
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