It’s clam digging season and that means clam fritters after sunset
Published 5:17 am Tuesday, November 25, 2025
What is it about digging for razor clams? My brother arrived Tuesday night for the opening of a clam digging week. The weather turned out lovely. In his youth, Jeff had a wing shot like Annie Oakley and terrorized the mallard population of Pacific County until he either found a new religion or decided he had shot enough. That hasn’t held forth for his fishing prowess. He is very good. When we dig clams, I’m happy to say that I can dig circles (clam holes) around him. That is quite a sight. We both have a balance problem and look like two drunks in a windstorm—and did on Tuesday night. None of that mattered. By five o’clock we had our limits and that is when the fun began. At home, Jeff whipped up marvelous clam fritters, and I repeated a recipe for clam and wild mushroom ceviche (last month’s offering in Coast Weekend), while Laurie added a peanut and cabbage vegetable offering. On a night when the setting sun painted the horizon with all the pink, topaz, and cranberry colors of a Renoir landscape, we reveled in one of the prettier beaches in our country, and later added the luxury of fine, if simple cuisine.
Ingredients:
6 cleaned and diced razor clams
1/2 red onion, finely diced
2 and 1/2 cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 tablespoon of corn starch in a water slurry
1/3 cup clam juice
1/3 cup milk or cream
3 eggs
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon minced parsley
Preparations:
Mix all the dry ingredients. Add three eggs. Mix in the liquids. Stir in the diced clams and the diced red onion and chopped parsley. Add the clam juice, milk or cream until reaching a very thick pourable consistency. Stir in the cornstarch slurry.
Sauté in canola oil until golden brown.
Jeff likes his fritters with butter and syrup. A nice salsa is fun for a savory option. A fried egg is also perfect over the fritters.
I also like a couple strips of pepper bacon on the side. An old-fashioned cup of hot coffee with a shot of bourbon is great on a cold night.
That night, we added Laurie’s peanut-cabbage dish, and a small serving of the ceviche.
One might also consider a sparkling cider from Ilwaco Cider Works.
David Campiche is a potter, poet, writer and lifelong resident of the Long Beach Peninsula.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source discoverourcoast.com ’
