July: Korean Clambake — The Dinner Party Resolution

We got very lucky with the weather in June for my mom’s birthday dinner, but I knew I should be nervous about July and August. We only have air conditioning in our bedroom and there’s something about our apartment walls that make them retain heat in the summer and let it out in the winter. But somehow the thought that I would have to get creative with the summer months escaped my mind when I offered to throw a going away dinner party for Mollie and Chris when they said they were moving to LA. And of course I couldn’t have known (nor could they) that there would be a heat wave the likes of which New York had never seen (or so it felt) that weekend. Which is how I found myself ransacking my parents apartment for fans and coolers and ice.

I’ve wanted to try Julia Turshen’s recipe for a Korean clambake since I got her cookbook a few years ago (as an apartment-dwelling New York City Jew, a clambake had never seemed accessible to me?), and given that we ended up with 17 people for this, I figured it’d be a good one-pot situation (with seafood, corn, and potatoes). Of course a few vegetarians incentivized me to get creative and it was actually Nick’s idea to add scallion ginger noodles into the mix, plus a salad and an insane amount of cape cod chips (I mean clambake, come on). Mollie also grew up having fruit pie for her birthday, so I briefly considered making a pie but wisely settled on a Smitten Kitchen strawberry cake.

I made the cake on Friday night (to get it out of the way and because Deb said it would be even better the next day). Trust me when I tell you that working on the batter while preheating the oven in a 100 degree apartment was like visiting hell. Nick, helpfully, kept popping into the kitchen to steal strawberries and let me know how hot it was. The big victory however was when I remembered that mixer I ordered for January’s dinner party (which had been sitting in an unopened box on top of the fridge since then). Guys, you’ll never believe it, but an electric mixer is like magic. It just does all the mixing for you. I’m in love. And once I got the cake in the oven, the whole apartment smelled like Special K with strawberries, it was intoxicating.

Then Saturday morning, I ran over to my parents house to borrow anything that could help cool down our apartment, and I made my trip to the fish store, and Trader Joe’s for ice pops, which we thought we might offer people when they walked in. At the fish store, I learned that I need to trust my gut more. I had written shrimp in my shopping list, but hadn’t specified shells on or not. I felt like they probably should have shells on from the one crawfish boil I have been to, but the man at the fish store suggested they clean them and remove the shells, so I followed his advice. When I got home, I confirmed that the cookbook asked for shrimp, shells-on.

I started the day’s cooking with an Asian dip I found on epicurious (one of those dips with at least two types of dairy and that you hope no one will ask what’s in it). And then Francis Lam’s scallion ginger sauce. Even though the recipe implores you not to stick your face in the scallion and ginger mixture after you pour the hot oil in (lest you BURN yourself), I couldn’t help myself — it smells so insanely good. This smell combined with the Special K smell that was still hanging heavily...and I have to say it worked. I tossed the sauce with a few pounds of fresh ramen noodles, thinking I’d serve this cold. A few learnings: as with the lady dinner party in March, people never eat as much ramen as if I was having a dinner party of just me and Nick, and it would have been better warm, the cold ramen got sort of clumpy.

Then I started on the clambake. I chopped everything that would need to be chopped and then took care of the seafood. I’d actually never cooked mussels before, so I’m not sure if you can ask for them to be cleaned (probably?) but they needed to be cleaned and “debearded” which was a fun extra task I had not planned for. Except for that, this recipe was awesome. It has you make a kimchi butter that was basically like crack. I let the butter coagulate a little too much so it wasn’t even distributed over everything, but when you got a bite of something that had the sauce it was insanely delicious.

We hadn’t had this many people over in a while, and it was so fun to have a real party. Particularly in honor of friends who have brought so many people together and who have added so much to my grownup life. I haven’t really lived in a city without Mollie and Chris since graduating from college, and I just know it can’t be as good without them. They are both so interesting and interested and they have introduced me to amazing people and activities and ideas.

We ate and drank and ate more, and those who stuck out the heat stayed, circled around one fan, worshipping its oscillation. I woke up on Sunday morning with ramen in my bathtub…and I’m choosing to take that as a sign that it went well.