Canned clams have more sand?

[Easton]

I made pasta with a red clam sauce a couple of weeks ago for my roommate and I. It was a bit crunchy or some weird texture which we figured was the excess sand in the clams. My roommate claims that fresh clams have less sand in them or at least he meant that you can be more efficient in cleaning them. Is this true?

[BreezyCooking]

Definitely not. I don't know what brand of sauce &/or clams you purchased, but I use canned clams all the time in all sorts of dishes & have never encountered any sand or grit ever during years of use.

I don't know where your roommate got that information, but fresh clams, if they have any sand at all, will have more than processed clams, which go through a more rigorous cleansing process than anything you could possibly put fresh clams through at home.

In addition, it really comes down to where/how the clams were harvested. Your canned clams are most frequently chopped sea clams (aka surf clams), which generally aren't harvested from the muddier/sandier conditions that fresh local hard & soft-shell clams do.

Take this from someone who spent the better part of her lifetime harvesting her own clams - both hardshell & softshell.

[Michael in FtW]

I've had canned clams and oysters .... same brands ... sometimes they were gritty - but most times (9+ out of 10) they were not.

[lyndalou]

Never had sand in canned clams and I use them a lot, also.

[Half Baked]

In all my life, I've only had sandy canned clams, maybe once. It must have something to do with the breand.