I am a foodie. I love to cook, I love to eat, and I love to share that passion. Doesn’t it just make you feel welcome when you walk into a house and there are wonderful food aromas coming from the kitchen? One of the older “tricks of the trade” in real estate is to instruct the seller to bake a batch of cookies just before the potential buyers are supposed to arrive. We are all seduced by the primal, comforting feelings that are released by the smell of food.
I have decided to start a new practice for all of my property listings; I am going to select food that I think represents the house best, explain the reason why, and provide a recipe . So here’s the first one.
The custom waterfront home on Sunlight Beach is a perfect home for clam chowder. Besides the sugar sand beach setting, which by itself is enough to qualify as a perfect place to enjoy a bowl of steaming hot clam chowder, close by Double Bluff is a great clamming beach with a long sweep of flats at low tide. Here are a few tips:
1) Obtain the necessary Shellfish license, and follow the rules and limits. You can do this online, or at numerous locations on Whidbey to include Ace Hardware in Freeland.
2) Check for the presence of marine biotoxins before you collect any shellfish. This is absolutely critical.
3) Toss the clams in a bucket of seawater (out of the sun) for a few days, and they will clean themselves of sand and grit.
My eldest grandson, Garrett came to visit us a few years ago. He just loves clam chowder, so we decided to do a chowder tasting whenever we went out for lunch or dinner. For the next two weeks, we happily tasted clam chowder from Seattle to the San Juan Islands to include my own recipe made from clams from nearby Holmes Harbor.
And the winner was unanimous – the chowder from Ray’s Boathouse, although mine came in a very close second. Here’s their recipe, courtesy of a wonderful cookbook entitled appropriately enough Ray’s Boathouse.
- 1/2 cup butter
1 pound red potatoes, cubed, skin on
1 stalk celery diced
1/2 white onion, diced
1 small carrot, diced
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
2 cups of fish stock or clam broth
3 cups heavy cream
2 cups half and half
1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1/4 te4aspoon Tabasco sauce
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 tablespoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 bay leaf
14 ounces steamed clams, chopped, with juice.
Garnish:
2 tablespoons chopped chives
Melt butter in a 5 quart stockpot over medium high heat. Add potatoes, celery, onion and carrot and saute for 5 minutes. Add flour and stir to make a roux. Add stock, cream, half-and-half, Worcestershire sauce, Tabasco sauce, pepper, salt, thyme, and bay leaf. Bring to a boil, stirring frequently. Reduce heat and simmer until potatoes are tender, about 15-20 minutes. Stir in clams. Garnish with chopped chives.
Serve with lots of fresh sourdough bread.
