Winsome Chowder and Mammoth Clams
The East Hampton Town Trustees’ Largest Clam Contest, an early-autumn tradition that celebrates the bounty of the town’s waterways, drew a crowd to the grounds of the trustees’ offices at the Lamb Building in Amagansett on Sunday.
Under mostly gray skies, those attending eagerly slurped Round Swamp Farm’s clam chowder, the pots empty some 40 minutes after the event’s noon start. Ten minutes later, the raw bar was devoid of all but shells. Both had been offered free to the public.
An official from the town’s shellfish hatchery, based at Fort Pond Bay in Montauk, displayed live marine life and described the hatchery’s efforts to seed waterways with juvenile shellfish. The East End Classic Boat Society displayed and sold tickets for its 2018 raffle boat, a 12-foot rowing and sailing dinghy called Ellen, constructed by the society’s members. The winning raffle ticket will be drawn at the society’s holiday open house on Dec. 8 from 2 to 4 p.m. at the Community Boat Shop.
The trustees also sold T-shirts, including one depicting the “balloon fish” designed by Susan McGraw Keber of the trustees to raise awareness about the danger balloons pose to marine life. Proceeds are allocated to the trustees’ William T. Rysam scholarship fund.
A team of judges sampled the nine clam chowders entered in this year’s contest. “I think we have some very talented cooks in East Hampton,” one judge, Charlotte Sasso of Stuart’s Seafood Market in Amagansett, said as the tasting got underway. Entries, she said, featured “a lot of fresh ingredients, some with a spin” on traditional chowders, like the inclusion of corn or mushrooms.
“It’s a tough challenge,” Ms. Sasso said, perhaps hoping to alleviate the concerns of any contestant who might cast a skeptical eye on the judges’ acumen. “I’m happy to rise to the challenge.”
Even greater excitement, and more objective mediating, was at the clam contest, however, as behemoth quahogs lined up for their moment in the spotlight, seated one by one on a scale for their formal weigh-in. At this, the trustees’ 28th annual contest, the afternoon’s climactic moment came when winners were announced.
In the ages 4-to-14 division, Patrick O’Donnell took the prize for Accabonac/Hog Creek with his six-ounce clam. Tyler Persan took the largest clam from Lake Montauk, at 10.7 ounces. The prize for largest clam from Napeague Harbor, junior division, went to Hailey Lagarenne, who harvested a 1-pound-10-ounce specimen. And Ellis Rattray took honors for Three Mile Harbor with his 1-pound-4.3-ounce clam.
Among the adults, William Solimeno’s 1-pound-7-ounce entry was the largest to come from Accabonac/Hog Creek. Clint Bennett was a two-time winner this year, his 1-pound-8-ounce behemoth taking honors for Three Mile Harbor and a 1-pound-6.4-ounce clam winning for Lake Montauk.
Finally, the man behind the largest overall clam was revealed to be Edward Hoff Jr., whose 2-pound-4.8-ounce monster harvested from Napeague Harbor dwarfed all rivals.
Ellis’s cousin Teddy Rattray won the “smallest clam contest” with his estimate of 1,000 juvenile “seed” clams in a jar. The 1,076 babies were all to be seeded into local waters.
The chowder was not about to be upstaged, however. “Everyone did a superb chowder,” Ms. McGraw Keber said of the nine entries. When the judges’ expertly rendered opinions had been compared, contrasted, and reconciled like so much minced clam, potato, celery, butter, onion, clam juice, bacon, salt, and pepper, Spencer Guptill’s winsome red chowder was deemed best. Asked to describe his vision and divulge the secret to his success, Mr. Guptill was succinct. “It started out as white,” he said.
“It was quite tasty,” Ms. McGraw Keber told her colleagues at the trustees’ meeting on Monday. “I wish he’d make some more.”