I took a few for the team and decided to make a comparison in Cambridge before the memory of Jake’s faded from my tongue. There’s always the danger that you romanticize the food you’ve had on vacation. You’ve spent the day at the beach, you’re in that blissful state of having been baked in the sun, coated in a nice mix of sand and salt. Perhaps, anything will taste good.
So, now that I’m washed of all salt and sand and sin I ordered tonight from Summer Shack, the closest place that offers stuff similar to Jake’s.
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Clam chowder v clam chowder: The SS offering had marginally more flavor, but was faintly lemony (or worse, was off) – not a plus. There were fewer clams (and they were tougher), bigger chunks of potatoes and the chowder was very heavy on the cream. Jake’s was the clear winner, with its thinner texture and cleaner taste (although I now regret not adding to it some of the sea salt we’d brought in one packet, and the coarsely ground peppercorns in another – they would have raised Jake’s to full perfection).
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Fried clams v fried clams: Here SS narrowly edged Jake’s, simply because they had 4 gloriously fat-bellied clams. The rest were small, and on those they drew with Jake’s.
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Mussels v mussels: Jake’s all the way. The SS ones were slightly overcooked and the broth was flat. It may sound like faint praise to say that Jake’s cooks its stuff to the right degree, but I think everybody here appreciates how easy it is to overcook seafood, and how often that mistake is made. It’s an achievement that Jake’s doesn’t.
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Grilled salmon on saffron rice, with asparagus: No swordfish at SS to compare with Jake’s, but the salmon was slightly overcooked, and – worse – the rice and asparagus were undercooked. People have taken this al dente thing too far in recent times. There’s a significant line between leaving a little toothiness to rice or pasta, and leaving an entirely uncooked core, or leaving asparagus in a state where you’re forced to spit out fibers.
Bottomline: Jake’s!!! You go, grrrrl!!!
