Alle vongole with the olive oil taken out and Breton seaweed butter put in. A kilo of cockles opened in a Dutch oven with 70 g of Bordier Seaweed Butter, their liquor strained clean of sand, then tossed through spaghettini with parsley and lemon zest and finished with a quenelle of more butter on each plate. It serves four, the whole thing runs on one pot and one pasta pan, and it is on the table in under half an hour.
At a glance
- Difficulty: Intermediate (Bordier rates it moyen)
- Serves: 4
- Active time: About 25 minutes (our estimate, Bordier does not state one)
- Cook: 8 to 10 minutes for the pasta, 5 minutes for the cockles
- Key ingredient: 70 g (2½ oz) Bordier Seaweed Butter, plus 5 g per plate to finish
Why this works
Seaweed butter was the first flavored butter Bordier ever made, back in 1986, and it came out of a meal with friends rather than a test kitchen. It is butter worked with iodised Breton seaweed, and the flavor it carries is not fishy but mineral and faintly saline, the smell of a beach at low tide. Against cockles, which are already saline and sweet, it does not compete. It amplifies.
The technique is the classic vongole move done with butter instead of oil. Cockles open in the hot fat and release their liquor into it, and that liquor plus the butter is the entire sauce. There is no cream, no wine, no stock. What makes it work is emulsification: the starchy pasta, the shellfish liquor and the butterfat come together into something that coats the strands rather than pooling at the bottom of the bowl. Straining the liquor is not fussiness. Cockles are buried in sand for a living and there is no way to serve them without doing it.
Ingredients
Cockles are the specified shellfish. Small hard-shell clams, manila clams or littlenecks, work the same way and are easier to find in the US.
| Ingredient | Metric | US |
|---|---|---|
| Cockles or small clams | 1 kg | 2.2 lbs |
| Spaghettini | 500 g | 17½ oz, about 1 lb 1½ oz |
| Bordier Seaweed Butter, plus more to finish | 70 g, plus 5 g per plate | 2½ oz, plus 1 tsp per plate |
| Italian parsley | As needed | As needed |
| Lemon | 1 | 1 |
| Salt (for the pasta water) | To taste, in 4 to 5 liters water | To taste, in 4 to 5 quarts water |
Method
Step 1: Clean the cockles and start the pasta
Tip the cockles into a sieve and rinse them under cold running water. They should close as you handle them. Throw away any that stay open. Bring 4 to 5 liters (4 to 5 quarts) of salted water to a boil, add the pasta, and cook until al dente, 8 to 10 minutes.
Step 2: Open the cockles and strain the liquor
While the pasta cooks, melt 70 g of the Seaweed Butter in a large Dutch oven. Turn the heat up, add the cockles, and cook for 5 minutes. They must open, and any that do not should be discarded. Leave a few in the shell for the plates and shell the rest. Strain the cooking liquid to get rid of any remaining sand. Chop the parsley finely. Set the seaweed butter and cockle juice aside in a pot.
Step 3: Toss, plate, and finish with butter
Drain the pasta at al dente and toss it with the seaweed butter and cockle juice. Plate it in warmed bowls. Scatter over the reserved cockles in their shells, the chopped parsley, and some lemon zest. Set a quenelle of butter on each pile of pasta.
Tips from our kitchen
- Strain the liquor twice. Once through a fine sieve, then once more through a coffee filter or a doubled square of cheesecloth. Cockles hold sand between their shells and nothing ruins a plate faster. Let the strained liquor stand for a minute and pour off the top, leaving the last spoonful behind.
- Undercook the pasta by a minute. Bordier says 8 to 10 minutes and then says to cook it al dente again in step three, which reads as one action described twice. Pull the spaghettini a minute short of the box time, because it will keep cooking as you toss it in the hot butter and liquor.
- Save a cup of pasta water. Cockle liquor and butter alone can be thin. A splash of starchy pasta water is what pulls the sauce together and makes it cling. Add it a little at a time while tossing.
- Do not salt the sauce. Cockle liquor is seawater and Seaweed butter is made from semi-salted butter. Between them the dish is seasoned. Salt the pasta water, then taste before you reach for anything else.
- Five minutes is a maximum, not a target. Cockles open in two or three minutes over high heat. Pull them out as they open rather than waiting for the last stragglers, or the early ones turn to rubber.
- Zest, not juice. Lemon zest scattered at the end perfumes the plate. Juice thins the emulsion and dulls the seaweed. If you want more acidity, put lemon wedges on the table.
How to serve it
Warm bowls, immediately, with the reserved cockles arranged on top so people can see what they are eating. Bread on the table for the liquor at the bottom. A cold Muscadet sur lie is the Breton answer and a Vermentino is the Italian one, and both work. The pasta itself matters more than usual here since there is so little else in the dish, and our Pasta Mancini guide explains what bronze-die extrusion does for a sauce this light.
Where to buy Bordier Seaweed Butter in the US
The French Pantry ships Bordier butter across the United States in insulated overnight packaging, straight from the workshop in Brittany.
- Churned Seaweed Butter by Bordier (4.4 oz): the original Bordier flavored butter from 1986, worked with iodised Breton seaweed.
For the rest of the hand-churned range, browse the Maison Bordier collection.
Frequently asked questions
How much Bordier butter do I need for this recipe?
One block. Bordier blocks are 4.4 oz (125 g). The recipe uses 70 g in the pot plus 5 g on each of four plates, which is 90 g in total, so a single block covers it with about 35 g to spare. Two blocks if you are doubling it.
Can I use a different Bordier butter?
Wild Garlic and Kampot Pepper butter is the other natural choice for a clam pasta and gives you a garlicky version instead of a marine one. Salted butter works if you add a squeeze of lemon and more parsley, though you lose the iodine note that makes this dish what it is.
What if I cannot find cockles?
Manila clams or littlenecks are the standard US substitute and open in about the same time. Keep the weight at 1 kg (2.2 lbs) since much of that is shell. Mussels will work but bring a sweeter, less saline liquor.
How should I store the butter?
Refrigerate it, wrapped, and use it by the date on the pack. Tightly wrapped it freezes for up to three months, though the texture is best fresh.
Does Bordier butter need to be refrigerated?
Yes. Bordier butter is a fresh, hand-churned product and ships cold. Refrigerate it as soon as it arrives, and keep the 5 g finishing quenelles cold until the plates are ready.
How do I know a cockle is safe to eat?
Raw cockles should close when tapped or handled. Discard any that stay open before cooking. After cooking, discard any that failed to open. Both checks are in Bordier's method for a reason.
Related reading
- Pasta Mancini
- Bordier Butter: What It Is, Why Chefs Love It, and How to Use It
- How to Choose Your French Butter: A Buyer's Guide
Recipe and photograph adapted from Maison Bordier, with thanks. The French Pantry is an authorized US retailer of Bordier butter.