Keep Clam and Carry On

for a little Labor Day celebration we headed to Anacortes to relax with friends and keep up with the tradition of "living off the land". It was a great time, and we ate almost exclusively stuff that we foraged: crabs, clams, crawfish and berries (blackberry pie recipe to come), and it was fantastic. The first night we had a 15-crab feast, which we ate almost all of, we used the leftovers for crab dip the next day. The second night, after cleaning buckets and buckets of clams, we had a clam linguine with tomatoes, basil and lemon. Here are some labor of love recipes. 

crab feast and laughter.

cooking the crawfish.

linguine with clams and other goodness.

Crab Dip
5 garlic cloves chopped, and cooked in a little olive oil
1/2-1 cup crab
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 cup cheese (we used Brie and mozzarella)
Paprika for sprinkling on top


Mix all ingredients, minus the paprika, in an oven-safe bowl or baking dish.  Bake for 25 minutes in a in a 350 degree oven. Serve with French bread or crackers.


Linguine with Clams, Lemon and Tomatoes
Salt
1 pound linguine (I used Trader Joes chive and another cracked pepper flavor)
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
8 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
2 lemons, zested and juiced
1/2 cup dry white wine
1-2 cups heirloom cherry tomatoes (halved or quartered)
1 cup grated Parmigiano Reggiano
1/4 cup flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
1/2 cup (10 or 12 leaves) fresh basil, very thinly sliced
1 cup of cleaned clams, cut into bite-sized pieces

Directions

Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Salt the water and drop the pasta into the pot. Heat a large deep skillet over low heat. Add extra-virgin olive oil and garlic and crushed red pepper flakes.

When the pasta has been cooking about 5 minutes, add lemon juice, a ladle of the cooking water from the pasta and the wine to the garlic and oil. Raise heat a bit to bring sauce to a bubble, and cook until wine has reduced a bit.  Add clams.

Drain pasta when it still has a good bite to it, al dente. Add lemon zest and half of the cheese to the sauce. Season the sauce with salt, to taste. Add pasta to pan and turn off heat. Toss the pasta with sauce a minute or 2, allowing it time to soak up the sauce. Add the herbs and toss.

Top the plates of pasta or platter with remaining cheese.

"sounds like dinner number two to me. did we not feed you enough chili dogs?"

Kristin and Elof moved into a loverly new loft. It is very nice and comes with rooftop access. Rooftop access includes such highlights as: a magic, gas-burning fire pit filled with brown glass beer bottle shards, various owl decoys, free (probably) basil and thyme herbs, one seagull (not scared by the owl decoys) that poops in the corner, three BBQ grills for which to make chili dogs and a view of the entire Puget Sound. You must bring your own novelty-sized bottle of wine. Thanks for sharing your chili, dog.

The KEXP BBQ was free this year with the headliner Dinosaur Jr. I had never heard of them, but they played a nice cover of The Cure's Just like Heaven. Lily said, "this is the only song of theirs I know." Samesies, but only because it's not Dino Jr., it's The Cure.

After the show we went to Tavolata and enjoyed a boatload of pasta dinner and accompaniments. Everything we had was delicious, salumi platter, yellow beet salad with gorgonzola, oxtail pasta, clam pasta, lamb pasta and squid pasta with prawns and anchovies, my most favorite of all was the squid pasta. if you count the salami, during that meal we consumed seven different animals. way to go everybody.