Fired up for fish

CAMBRIDGE -- In the Summer Shack kitchen, owner Jasper White is grilling Cape Cod littlenecks over a wood fire. When the clams open, their sweet frothy juice drips over the edges of the shells. A little garlicky butter and they're ready to eat.

This is White's kind of food, what he grew up with and what he loves to cook. It is, explains the New Jersey native, shore food. Lately, White has been grilling all kinds of fish -- not just clams but oysters, lobsters, squid, swordfish, sardines, and sea bass -- from his new "The Summer Shack Cookbook" (W.W. Norton). It contains tricks, secrets, and hard-won shellfish know-how. "The book is about cooking simple food in the summer," says White. "It's the time of year when food is so beautiful. Cook on the grill, keep the house cool, and let the ingredients speak for themselves."

White has a gas grill set to a low temperature and a wood-burning grill right beside it that's 200 to 300 degrees hotter than the gas. He prefers the wood grill. "A hot grill is really important when you're cooking fish," says White. "Clean, hot, well- oiled. That's what keeps the fish from sticking. And keep the food simple. Lemon and butter or lemon and olive oil is almost always enough."

At home, he uses a 48-inch Weber kettle. "If you like grilling, and you have the space, get a really big grill," he advises. "Use the extra space as a way to control the temperature." In other words, you can have a hot side of the grill for searing, and a spot where the heat isn't as intense. The chef might cook an entire menu on the grill. "It's not like I crave grilled vegetables," he says. "I'm not building a fire to grill vegetables. But once I'm outside and cooking on the grill I may as well put some vegetables on it."

He sets oysters curved sides down on a rack called Great Grate, which is a triangular piece of steel invented by Rhode Island hobbyist Tim Gilchrist. It keeps the oysters from wobbling and releasing their juices. A slot on the grate to insert tongs makes it easy for White to pull the triangle off the grill the second the oysters pop open. "It's like a Carolina oyster roast," he says. "The oysters are smoother and more elegant than the clams. You don't have to shuck but you can still have oysters on the half shell."

White writes menus daily, based on what he finds at the Fish Pier. "I just wait for the season." Today, he has squid from Rhode Island. He slices it on one side "accordion style" -- like a comb so the flesh is attached on one long side -- and tosses it with vinaigrette to marinate for a few minutes. On the grill the squid turns charred and smoky and the cuts open. "You know it's done when it's white all the way through," he says. "Be careful though. It's really tough if you over cook it."

The chef, who lost considerable weight in recent years, used to cook fancy food when he ran Jasper's, his fine dining waterfront restaurant. "Even when I owned Jasper's, we didn't go out much to fancy restaurants," he says. "We went to clam shacks and county fairs. That's how I like to eat." About 12 years ago, he left behind white tablecloths, and in 2000 he opened the first Jasper White's Summer Shack in Cambridge. Though he's been in Boston for 28 years, his roots are in Freehold, N. J., in Bruce Springsteen country (the two went to high school together), and just 10 minutes from the boiled blue crabs, corndogs, and funnel cake of the Asbury Park boardwalk. Now there are two more Summer Shacks in Boston, a fourth in Connecticut, and a fifth underway at the Trump Plaza Atlantic City Hotel and Casino.

The Cambridge location had housed the restaurant Aku Aku, a kitschy Polynesian spot. White wanted the warehouse-like space to look like some fishermen from Newfoundland had moved down to Cambridge to start a fish house. He ended up with a lively space, like hip boots meet hula skirts, complete with marine salvage and huts with corrugated aluminum roofs rubbing up against the original Gauguinish murals, turquoise pleather booths, and rattan chairs left over from Aku Aku. Somehow it works.

White drives a silver Prius, and with his nerdy glasses and messy gray hair, he looks like a chemist from one of the labs down the road. Many of his recipes come from time spent cooking at the beach. A few years ago, his wife Nancy's parents left them their summer house in Little Compton, R.I. "It's so close to the water you can hear the waves crashing on the rocks," says the chef. "In the summer we catch stripers right off the point. We can see all the way to the cliffs of Aquinnah on Martha's Vineyard. There's fresh fish, tomatoes, and corn from local farms. It's a great place to cook and eat."

At the restaurant, there are tanks of lobsters in the middle of the dining room. White pulls out a couple of snappy ones, steams them for 5 minutes, then splits the tails, drizzles them with oil, and places them on the fire. They go with aji verde, a Yucatan-style chunky guacamole with jalapeno and chopped hard-cooked eggs.

He sets a thick piece of swordfish on the hottest part of the grill, and when it's seared, he transfers it to a lower heat, then plates it with a cold cucumber sauce, something like Indian raita. "Hot fish, cold sauce," says the chef. "A nice contrast."

Fillets of black sea bass, with dramatic black and white checkered skin, are pristine. These are set flesh side down on the hot grill, then they're turned to slowly crisp the skin on a cooler side of the fire. He serves them with a simple fennel slaw. A row of fresh sardines need a medium fire all the way through. "Nothing but flavor," he says. "Not for people who don't love fish though." They're served with a tart Brazilian relish inspired by some of the cooks in the kitchen.

In this setting, with its mish-mash decor and all kinds of seafood moving across the grill to emerge smoky and slightly charred, the spirit of the beach is intact. "The key to this kind of cooking is to be flexible," says the chef. "That's real shore cooking -- you wake up see what you've got, and you let the menu unfold."

Jasper White's Summer Shack, 149 Alewife Brook Parkway, Cambridge, 617-520-9500; 50 Dalton Street, 617-867-9955; Terminal A, Satellite Building, Delta Airlines, Logan Airport. Great Grates cost $24.95 plus $8 shipping and handling from greatgrate.com or 401-364-3457.