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My family used to go clamming every other week or so at Surfer's Point in Ventura, CA. It was a rocky beach, with smooth, worn rocks of all shapes and sizes. They formed thousands of tidepools, some just small enough for one little clam, and others covering 100 square feet. You couldn't just go straight down to get at the clams. You had a metal hook with a short handle you'd use to leverage rocks out of the way, and you had to dig quickly because the clam could start trying to burrow further down into the sand. Those tide pools were awesome. We could rinse the clams off right in the water and eat them raw. That was how I learned how awesome the ocean tasted--fresh seafood. We'd harvest the seaweed that grew closest to the ocean for salads and catch tiny shrimp living in the seawood to mix with lemon juice or vinegar for ceviche. That beach isn't the same anymore, though. A lot of it has eroded away, and almost all of the tidepools are full of sand now.

We'd also go clamming for the giant Pismo clams up at Pismo beach, and that took a lot more effort because it was all just wet sand. Then, it was just my mom and aunts digging like crazy more than a foot down, just a little faster than their feet could sink. You had to try to get the clam before the next wave came in and swamped you out.

Seems a lot more complicated than just pouring some salt on the dip in the sand and waiting for the clam to poke out on its own. That's how Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall collected them on one of his River Cottage series.