Scallops on spinach
(a leftover half a small potato snuck in there too)
The title of this post alone
should clue you in that I’ve been eating quite a few meals in solitary splendor
because the Burtons’ schedule is busy this time of year. Sardines and scallops
are two things I would never serve for family dinner.
Sea or ocean scallops because
they are expensive, about $40 a lb. I find I am satisfied with a quarter lb.
which gives me three fat scallops. For the family I’d probably have to have a
pound and a quarter—not sure if Jacob would surprise me or not. But either way
that’s beyond the budget for a weeknight dinner.
I have a friend who assures me
that when I think I’m buying scallops, I’m buying shark. Not true if you shop with
a respectable fishmonger—I shop at Central Market and trust them. But there are
unscrupulous fishermen who flavor shark or skate to taste like scallops. These
substitutions are caught in unsustainable ways, so you take a risk with your
health if you eat them. How can you tell? Fake scallops are perfect cylinders,
as though they’d be stamped out of a machine. Nature never creates two things
quite alike, so real scallops are not uniform in size or appearance. Also they
have a small muscle on the side that can be removed before cooking.
Scallops are versatile You can
cover them with a gratin sauce or make traditional Coquilles St/ Jacques, which
puts the scallops in a wine-and-mushroom sauce, with mashed potatoes piped
around the edge of the dish (my mom had a huge shell dish she used for this).
But to me, nothing beats sauteed scallops in lemon butter sauce, So the other
night I had a terrific dinner. Here’s what I did.
Sauteed scallops with fresh
spinach
I forgot one stop: refrigerate
scallops for 20-30 minutes, uncovered, before cooking. This lets them dry out a
bit and makes it easier to achieve a brown crust.
I sauteed spinach in a generous
amount of butter, added some salt and pepper, drained it, and put it in a soup
plate (you can use a regular plate—I’m just having fun using my soup plates for
a lot of things these days).
I added more butter to the
skillet and heated it to high. I seasoned with salt and pepper and, when butter
was really hot, placed them in the skillet. It’s important not to move them at
this point so that a crust forms. Some chefs say one minute on one side. I did
two minutes on one side and then flipped them for one more minute. The big thing
about scallops is you don’t want to overcook them because they’ll turn to
rubber. For years, Jordan would never eat them outside my kitchen for fear they
were overcooked. I was careful dislodging scallops from skillet, but I still
left some brown behind. A real chef who has mastered this can get a nice crisp
uniform crust. After putting the scallops on the spinach, I lowered the heat a
bit and squeezed the juice of about half a lemon into the remaining butter, scraping
up any brown bits. I poured that sauce over the scallops and spinach.
Sardines
Sardines are a different
matter entirely—no one else in the house will eat them, though I doubt they’ve ever
tried (they are good at deciding ahead of a taste that they don’t like things).
People sometimes get sardines and anchovies mixed up—anchovies are much small,
much saltier, and stronger in flavor. The milder sardines are a good substitute
for tuna—the meat is mild, rich in protein and omega-3 acids which improve your
cognition and general health. They’re generally salty to some degree, but they
do not have high levels of mercury as tuna does. I’ve had sardines packed in mustard
sauce and tomato sauce—the latter was surprisingly good—but I’ve never had
fresh. I buy them canned in oil.
You can broil or roast
sardines with lemon and herbs, put them in pasta, add them to salads, grill them,
put them in puff pastry. On one of my home alone evenings recently, I had sardines
on toast. Here’s what I did:
Toast baguette slices—I think
I fixed four. While they are still warm, rub them “aggressively” with a cut
garlic clove. Then butter lightly. Top with a tomato slice, sardines (they are
hard to get out of the can, especially the first one, so you may get bits and
pieces, but that doesn’t matter). Top that with slivers of sweet onion—I happened
to have pickled onion in the refrigerator so that’s what I used. Drizzle with
lemon and olive oil. These are messy to eat but oh so good!
My ex-husband used to make
sardine salad, an idea I’m sure he got from his mother who cooked a lot of
traditional Jewish food: Drain and mash a can of sardines with salt, pepper,
and lots of lemon. Good as a spread on crackers or a sandwich filling.
Don’t let the fishy notion
scare you away. Sardines are great for a snack, an appetizer, or dinner alone.
Sardines on toast
