Baby clams, like other kinds of seafood such as crabs, shrimps, razor clams, etc, can be cooked with tamarind water (made from tamarind pulp stirred in water) into palatable dishes.
Tamarind pods, or pulps, are used quite popularly in many Vietnamese food. They add sour taste to sour soups, and add sweet-sour taste to stir-fried foods. Other sour fruits can be used to bring in the sourness to the food too, but tamarinds are always preferred in sweet-sour dishes.
This particular dish is easy to cook. Just a small notice that we cook the whole live baby clams, so make sure we wash them very well before cooking.
