Recipe: Scallops and Salsify

Name: Scallops and Salsify
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 40 min
Total time: 70 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: French
Ingredients: 12 halved Roma tomatoes, seeded and blanched; 18 scallops, sliced in half lengthwise (making 36 half-pieces); 10.5 oz (300 g) fresh or frozen cooked salsify; 4 tablespoons persillade (fresh parsley chopped + garlic); 0.6 cup (15 cl) prepared poultry stock; Salt and freshly ground pepper; Olive oil and butter

By chef patrick Asfaux 5/5 (2 reviews)

Prep 30 min

Cook 40 min

Total 1h10

Servings 4 serv.

Scallops can split during cooking if you forget them for 30 seconds too long. Cook for a maximum of 1 minute per side, with a nice golden skin and meat still pearlescent in the center. Here we place them on roasted tomatoes and sautéed salsify: sea and land on the same plate.

Ingredients for 4 servings

Adjust for

servings

12 halved Roma tomatoes, seeded and blanched
18 scallops, sliced in half lengthwise (making 36 half-pieces)
10.5 oz (300 g) fresh or frozen cooked salsify
4 tablespoons persillade (fresh parsley chopped + garlic)
0.6 cup (15 cl) prepared poultry stock
Salt and freshly ground pepper
Olive oil and butter

Step-by-step directions

1 In the morning, preheat your oven to 390°F (200 °C) (gas mark 7).

2 Sprinkle a little fine salt on your halved tomatoes and turn them over on a plate for 10 minutes.

3 Pour a little olive oil into the bottom of an ovenproof dish, then add the tomato halves, season with pepper and distribute a little persillade in each one. Cook in the oven for 20 minutes and set aside.

4 Before serving, preheat your oven to 355°F (180 °C) (gas mark 6).

5 Set up 2 pans on your stove: one with butter and olive oil for sautéing the salsify and another with just olive oil for the scallops.

6 When your pans are very hot (brown butter in one and olive oil in the other), add your salsify on one side and scallops on the other, season with salt and pepper. For the scallops, cook for 1 minute on each side, then remove them. Put the pan back on the heat and pour in the poultry stock, scrape up the browned bits from the bottom, bring to a boil and strain through a fine sieve into a small bowl. For the salsify, when they're nicely colored, remove them to a plate.

7 In each tomato half, arrange 3 scallop halves, then bake for 10 minutes with the salsify. To plate: on nice dishes, arrange 3 tomato halves garnished with scallops arranged in a star pattern, salsify sticks arranged nicely, and a stream of hot stock around the plate with a few parsley leaves. This blend of "land and sea" flavors gives this dish its originality, and I'm sure it will be appreciated by your guests. Note: the Roma tomato is an elongated tomato from the Solanaceae family, originally from Peru, with a sweet taste. What makes it special is that it releases practically no vegetable water. For instructions on preparing salsify yourself, we will post that separately.

A chef's advice

One minute per side, not thirty seconds more. Beyond that, the flesh becomes rubbery and dry. The trick: prepare everything ahead of time (roasted tomatoes, sautéed salsify) and add the scallops at the very last moment, exactly 120 seconds. A rich poultry stock sauce around the plate does the rest. The salsify brings that earthy quality that works perfectly with the sweet taste of Roma tomatoes.