When summer is over and fall hasn't started, it's
When summer is over and fall hasn't started, it's
time for clam chowder
Hello and welcome to Home Movies Tuesday-ish! If you’ve found your way over by some miracle but are not yet subscribed, here, let me help you with that:
Hello newsletter friends, happy to see you. Thanks for your patience as I hobble back to regularly scheduled programming after pretending to feel fine the last three months. It feels like best practice to fake it, but I’m bad at that, so I’d rather say: I’m pregnant and the first three months were very rough on me physically and I wasn’t up for anything that wasn’t lying horizontally staring into middle distance. I wasn’t working much at all, and as a person who’s defined their whole life and self worth by their work/how much they’re working/what they’re working on, it was a real “change of pace.” I spent a lot of time feeling guilty (and napping). America is sick!
All that to say, it’s strange to try and write “honestly” or authentically while omitting some extremely relevant/important information, but that’s how it goes. So…I just kind of didn’t. I’m bad at pretending—and thank god. Anyway, it felt nice to share the news this week, I was bowled over by the warm outpouring. I’ve always cried easily but now I cry VERY easily. Yesterday I cried a LOT. More on all that soon, or one day, or whenever it feels right. But today: Clam Chowder (!!).
Growing up in Southern California, my exposure to clam chowder was pretty limited. It was mostly a bowl (or cup) of very thick, very white stuff with tiny bits of pink canned clams and bits of potato floating around. I am still a fan of this style of clam chowder and will order it every time, but this is not that clam chowder.
When I moved to New York and had more direct exposure to New England (generally speaking), I had something closer to what I more enjoy now: a soupier, brothier, brinier version. The clams were often whole, not chopped, and the potatoes were of varying degrees of tender. It tasted homemade, not from a can, the imperfections adding to the charm.
My friend Scott, who’s from Maine, was the first person to tell me about this style of chowder (we worked together at Bon Appétit circa 2014 and talked a lot about regional food differences, often…chowder), claiming it was the most authentic or original or whatever style. I’m not here to entertain what is or isn’t The First Chowder, but I will say as the person cooking and eating the chowder, I decide that my personal version is also soupy, brothy and briny, not thick, lumpy or gloopy. There is no flour, no roux, no thickening by pureeing half the ingredients together. There is, however, celery, and because it tastes good and adds a nice sweetness, corn. Despite the (optional) bacon and heavy cream, it could even be described as light, making you able to eat one or two large bowls with ease. I like a version of anything that allows me to eat more of it.
While it’s completely optional, there are literally no downsides to serving Green Garlic Bread on the side. In fact, I really do recommend it (though Saltines are a good companion, too). Actual green garlic is out of season so this garlic bread is garlic bread with lots of herbs, so many herbs that it turns the butter green. Green Garlic Bread. Make it!
P.S. A note for anyone in New York in October: I’m extremely excited to talk with Stephen Colbert and his wife Evie about their new cookbook Does This Taste Funny? on Friday, October 4th. He wrote that Shallot Pasta served as the inspiration for his Red Rice, and I’ll be putting that on my resume moving forward. We’ll all be at The Town Hall to talk about cooking, writing books and what it’s like to play Chuck Noblet on Strangers with Candy. If you’d like a preview: watch this, and if you like what you see, you can buy tickets here.
For the full recipe, read on.
Director: Doron Max Hagay @doronmaxhagay / Producer: Graham Mason @grahambomason / Photography Director: Alex Bliss @albertblimp / Audio: Yves Albaret @yvesarmand / Camera Operator: Daniel Rampulla @danielrampulla / Camera Operator: Johnny Frohman @johnnyfrohman / Graphics: Gordon Landenberger @gordonlandenberger / Editor: Maya Tippett @maya.tippett
Clam Chowder with Corn and Bacon
Serves 6—8
Chowder, as a word, is not my favorite, but I do like the concept. A sort of brothy mishmash of ingredients in a pot, almost always potatoes, alliums and some sort of seafood but occasionally corn. Here, it’s both. Seafood (clams) for brininess AND corn for sweetness, AND a little bacon for a meaty smokiness (optional), gently simmered together. One might say that’s non-traditional or perhaps even too much but I’ll take both as a compliment because frankly, they’re tough to ever separate once you’ve experienced together. I will say if you have one and not the other (say, clams but not corn, or maybe you don’t eat bacon), this recipe still works, because I’m nothing if not flexible.
There aren’t really any tricks to this recipe and it’s nearly impossible to mess up– the hardest part is finding, soaking and scrubbing the clams (please don’t forget to soak and scrub the clams), then all the knife work you’ll be doing: chopping the vegetables and removing the corn kernels from the cob. From there it’s basic sauteing, simmering. The classics. I will say my one caveat to all this praise: if you’re expecting a thick, gloopy experience, you’ve come to the wrong place. There is no roux here, no flour, no blending. This clam chowder is more of the brothy, soupy, light and ethereal variety, ideal for the end of summer and beginning of fall, but would happily take you into the winter months, too.
5 lbs. clams, such as Littleneck, Manila, New Zealand, or a mix
6 ounces slab or sliced bacon, cut into ½” pieces (can also substitute 4 tablespoons unsalted butter or olive oil)
4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced or finely chopped
2 large leeks or 1 large yellow or white onion, chopped
Kosher salt, freshly ground black pepper
4 celery stalks or 1 fennel bulb, halved lengthwise and thinly sliced (celery leaves reserved if you have them)
3–4 ears corn, kernels removed
1½–2 pounds potatoes (Yukon gold preferred but any type is fine really), cut into 1” pieces
4 cups heavy cream
1 fresh or dried bay leaf (or a few sprigs of thyme), optional
Parsley, Saltines, hot sauce and/or lemon wedges, for serving
1. Soak your clams in a bowl of cold water. Let them hang out here as long as possible—up to the night before (in the fridge), if you think of it, but at least 30 minutes.
2. With the water gently running, use a clean kitchen scrubber to scrub the clams, focusing on the hinge (not the opening) and ridges of the shell, where most of the grit and sand lives. Change the water so they’re sitting in a bowl of clean water and set aside while you make the chowder base.
2. Heat a large pot over medium heat. Add bacon (if not using, heat butter or olive oil in the pot and skip ahead to step 3) and cook, stirring occasionally, until the fat has rendered considerably, 10–12 minutes (the bacon shouldn’t be crisped, just lightly browned).
3. Increase heat to medium-high and add garlic and leeks to the pot. Season with salt and pepper and cook, stirring occasionally, until the leeks are bright green and softened, 6–8 minutes.
3. Add celery, corn and potatoes and season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are on their way to tender (but not yet falling apart), sweating a bit to evaporate some of the water and concentrate their flavors, 8–10 minutes.
4. Add heavy cream, bay leaf (if using–and you should!) and 5 cups water (you can also use clam juice but I find water to be flavorful enough). Season with salt and lots of pepper and bring to a simmer. Reduce heat to medium and cook until potatoes are totally cooked through and tender, nearly falling apart, 20–25 minutes. Taste the broth—it should be flavorful and delicious already, even without the clams. The liquid should also be considerably thicker—both from the evaporation and the potatoes falling apart a little.
5. Add the clams and cover the pot. Bring back to a simmer and cook, without peeking, 5 or so minutes. The clams should start to steam open, give up their juices and further flavor the broth. You don’t want to boil the clams after they’ve opened (they can get tough), but keeping them gently simmering is okay. Season with salt to taste and more pepper.
6. From here, you have a few choices. You can serve immediately. You can pluck the clams from the pot, remove them from the shell and either chop them or keep whole and return to the pot. You can let the chowder “cure” for a day or two (some swear by this) or eat it right away. Any of these is fine by me. I’m an instant gratification person and frankly like the presentation of whole shells and the larger pieces of clam.
7. To serve, finely chop parsley and or celery leaves and sprinkle over top. Serve alongside crackers or garlic bread, hot sauce and/or lemon.
Green Garlic Bread
Serves 6—8
This is more of a formula than a recipe. Use as much garlic as you’d like, use whatever herbs you have on hand….but whatever you do, please use a lot of garlic and a lot of herbs (this is “green garlic bread” after all). For bread, you can use whatever you have or prefer. My favorite is a baguette—to me, it’s that perfect ratio of crusty on the outside, pillowy on the inside, with plenty of nooks and crannies to catch all of the butter (plus, it looks especially dramatic on the table when served halved lengthwise). If there happens to be any extra, this butter is also excellent dolloped into a soup, stew, or clam chowder you might be serving alongside.
2 sticks/½ pound/8 ounces unsalted butter, room temperature
2–8 cloves garlic, finely grated
1 cup parsley, chives, or a mix, very finely chopped
Kosher salt, freshly ground black pepper
1 baguette or sourdough loaf or whatever bread you like for this, halved lengthwise
1. Preheat oven to 425°F.
2. In a medium bowl, combine butter, garlic, and herbs, and season with salt and pepper. Using a fork, mix everything together until well-combined.
3. Using a spoon, evenly spread the butter onto each half of the baguette. Season with pepper and maybe a bit of flaky salt.
4. Place the bread on a rimmed baking sheet or aluminum foil (if using aluminum foil, fold it up around the edges to create a rim in case any butters escapes) and bake until it’s deeply browned and very crispy on the outside, but still soft and tender on the inside, 8–10 minutes.
5. Remove from oven and slice to serve.
In order to properly make this chowder, you’ll need a big pot. I love my all-clad pan for soups and stews including this one.
You can use any heavy cream, but “the good stuff” is really just so so good. I love Clark Farms out of Delhi, NY. Come pick some up at First Bloom if you’re around.
For my liminal late summer/early fall chowder-eating uniform, I’m wearing this necklace paired with my favorite jeans, and this Sezane shirt in *celery leaf * green (looks like most sizes are sold out but there are plenty of other lovely colors in this style).
The garlic bread will be much easier to make with a microplane and much tastier with this butter (also at First Bloom!).
When you’re ready to serve, it’s not easy to find the right bowl to contain a chowder like this. I love these bowls for pastas, soups, and all dishes that have a tendency to spill out—and you’ll find these sweet little water glasses at every dinner I host.
CONGRATULATIONS, ALISON!
(oh, the recipe looks great, too.)
Congratulations! I’m thrilled for you. ❤️