Spaghetti alle vongole

I think I’ve had enough of my little expat kitchen. I don’t mean this one here of course, but my actual little expat kitchen, the room in my apartment that is small, bursting at the seams with things I have accumulated over the years, the kitchen that drives me crazy because I need.more.space. If anyone but me dares to take even a single plate out of one of my cupboards, they’ll most certainly end up with a dozen other plates on their heads. You need to be dexterous and somewhat of a magician to handle the overcrowded chaos that is my kitchen.

Also, we rent our apartment, and in most cases here in the Netherlands, big city apartments have small, nay, tiny kitchens that most of the time come with the electrical appliances, which is not a good thing. No one who rents buys the major appliances, which means that you get stuck with some that may be old, dysfunctional and, well, impractical. Such is the case with mine.

The oven is too small, too old and heats in patches. The refrigerator is small, with a rickety shelf (that’s kind of my fault) and a tiny freezer. The gas stove is, you guessed it, small, and for the last couple of weeks the bigger gas ring is not working (that’s not my fault). I may have some fancy pots and pans but I can’t use them.

This situation has taken away my will to cook. For this and various other reasons, we have been thinking of moving for a long time now, but it’s not that easy because I can’t find an apartment with a kitchen that I like. Yes, it’s come to this, the kitchen is the only room in a house that matters to me.

Anyway, I could go on and on about this for a looong time, so let’s get down to what’s important here. The food. I only needed the two gas rings in my kitchen that work for this, so I put them to good use and made a fantastic spaghetti alle vongole, that classic Italian, or Neapolitan to be exact, dish that truly is breathtakingly delicious in its simplicity.

The most important ingredient is of course the vongole (clams), and you need to buy them fresh, don’t use canned or bottled ones, unless you want to ruin the dish. The sweet, supple vongole, with that fresh, intense aroma of the sea is what this dish is all about. As for the rest of the ingredients, you most probably already have them in your kitchen; spaghetti, garlic, olive oil, white wine, dried red chilli flakes, fresh parsley.

As soon as we sat on the table, I couldn’t stop devouring the plump, briny flesh of the bivalves, swiftly twirling the spaghetti around my fork, slurping on any stray strand that had the audacity to resist getting into my mouth, dunking my bread into the aromatic sauce with the light acidity from the white wine, with the chili that tingled my palate and the garlic, present but not overpowering.

This ultimate taste of summer, just before its unofficial end, was exactly what I needed and it made me realize that I may not have the kitchen of my dreams, but what I create in it can be, at times, dreamy.

Spaghetti alle Vongole in bianco (Spaghetti with Clams in a white sauce)

The Italians prepare this dish in two ways: a) in rosso, meaning in a red (tomato) sauce and b) in bianco, meaning in a white sauce without tomato. I prefer the second version of the dish as in my opinion, tomatoes overpower the flavor of the little mollusks.
By the way, the broth-like juices are essential in the dish, so make sure to have some bread to soak them all up.

This dish is easy but also a bit tricky. The spaghetti need to be cooked al dente, the vongole should be just cooked and not overcooked otherwise they’ll become rubbery, and the bringing together of the two needs good timing. Also, the correct cleaning of the vongole is important (in the recipe I explain in detail how to do it).

Oh and something else, spaghetti alle vongole is never topped off with cheese. If you insist on adding cheese, I will turn a blind eye, but don't let any Italians see you.

Yield: 4 main-course servings

Ingredients
1 kg fresh, live vongole (palourdes / small clams)
400 g spaghetti (I used De Cecco no12)
4 plus 1 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil, plus extra for finishing the dish
2 garlic cloves, minced
¼ tsp dried chilli flakes
250 ml dry white wine (I used Pinot Grigio)
A handful of flat-leaf parsley leaves, finely chopped
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper

Special equipment: large bowl, large and deep frying pan with lid


Preparation

Cleaning the vongole
Vongole should be alive when you buy them. You can store them in the fridge for 1 day before you use them. Place them inside a bowl while they’re still inside the net (they’re usually sold wrapped in small nets) and you can loosely cover them with a plastic bag. Just make sure you make holes in the bag for the air to circulate.

When you want to prepare them for cooking, you need to clean them. The vongole have sand inside and if not purged, the dish will be sandy and grainy. For the vongole to purge the sand, they need to be put in salted water for a few hours. The vongole will open up, take in the clean water from one side and purge the sand from the other.

Remove them from the net (or any other packaging), rinse them well under cold running water, checking if their shells are clean. If not, rub them with your hands or a soft brush to remove any dirt. Transfer them to a large bowl, add enough water to cover them and add 3-4 Tbsp salt. Stir them around with your hands and cover the bowl with a dark-colored tea towel (the vongole open when it’s dark) and leave the bowl in your kitchen, somewhere shady, not in direct sunlight. Leave them like that to purge the sand for 3 to 5 hours, depending how much time you have, and then remove each vongole from the bowl. You’ll notice that the water is now dirty. Discard any vongola that has a broken shell and keep the ones that are tightly closed. If you find any that are open, tap them gently and if they close after a few seconds, keep them, otherwise discard them because they’re dead. Place the vongole in a clean bowl until ready to use, which should be soon.

Cook the spaghetti
Boil the spaghetti in salted boiling water until cooked al dente (to the tooth) or to your liking, stirring often so they don’t stick to one another.

Cook the vongole
While the spaghetti is cooking, in a large frying pan add 4 Tbsp of olive oil and heat over medium heat. Add the garlic and the chilli flakes and sauté for 1 minute, being careful not to burn the garlic. It will become very bitter if you do. Add the wine, turn heat on to high and once the wine begins to bubble, add the vongole, stir well and put on the lid. Boil/steam the vongole for about 3 minutes until their shells have just opened, shaking the pan from time to time. Do not overcook them as they’ll become rubbery and lose their flavor. Remove pan from the heat and ideally at this point the spaghetti should be ready. Strain them and add them to your vongole, add some black pepper and 1 Tbsp of olive oil, and mix well. Give it a taste to see if it needs any salt. The vongole have that natural salty quality from the sea, so most probably you won't have to add any salt.

Serve immediately into bowls, sprinkle with some extra black pepper, parsley and a little olive oil to finish.
In case you find any vongole that haven’t opened, discard them.

Enjoy with some bread and white wine. Pinot Grigio is an excellent choice.