Easy Lemon Garlic Butter Asari Clams Recipe

Lemon Garlic Butter Asari Clams is definitely one of those dishes you can easily whip up without much time and effort. We all know that the combination of lemon, garlic and butter can go no wrong, especially on seafood! The use of sake in the recipe also helps to further bring out the flavours of the clams.

Our recipe is really simple – all you need is a few simple ingredients that are common in households and the cooking process takes just about 5 minutes with a few easy steps. Fresh clams are ideal for this dish but make sure they are properly de-gritted (instructions below) and cooked within a day after purchase. If you are unable to find fresh ones, you can also use frozen ones like we did. You can serve it with some Japanese rice and toast some bread to soak up the remaining stock as it is so flavourful and too good to waste!

Ingredients (serves 2-4):

– 350g of fresh/frozen asari clams
– 2 tbsps of butter
– 5 cloves of garlic
– 50ml of sake
– 1 lemon wedge
– 1 green onion/ 1 tbsp of parsley
– Sea salt, to taste

Preparation

Whenever you prepare a dish with fresh clams, make sure you get rid of the sand and dirt in them first. This process is known as de-gritting which is an important process to prepare the clams so that they are suitable for consuming, otherwise you may end up biting into and eating small bits of stones in your dish. To do this, you need just salt and water.

Use just enough water to cover the clams’ mouths. The amount of salt used should be 3-4% of your water. Soak the fresh clams in the salt water to for about an hour to de-grit, then drain them and soak in clean water for another 30 minutes to de-salt.

If you are using frozen clams, simply defrost before cooking. (We are using frozen vacuum-packed ones from OKEANOSS in NTUC as they did not have fresh ones)

Step 1
Finely chop the garlic and spring onions.

Step 2
Melt the butter in a pan/pot on medium heat. Add garlic and sauté till fragrant.

Step 3
Add the clams and the sake. Stir and cook on cover until the clams are all opened up.

Step 4
Taste the stock and add sea salt to season if needed.

Step 5
Squeeze the lemon wedge over the dish. Add your favoured herbs like dried parsley or green onions. Remove from heat and serve.