Scallops Baked with a Julienne of Vegetables

Scallops Baked with
a Julienne of Vegetables

Serves 4 as a main course,
8 as an appetizer

Scallops Baked
with a Julienne of Vegetables 1 pound (4 or 5 medium) plum tomatoes
2 tablespoons minced parsley
1 tablespoon minced basil
1 clove garlic minced
2-1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter divided
1/4 cup julienned celery
1/4 cup julienned carrots
1/4 cup julienned white turnip's
1/4 cup julienned leek (white part only)
Salt and pepper
1 pound bay scallops
Additional parsley for garnish

Preheat the oven to very hot, 450 degrees F.

Start by preparing the tomatoes. Bring a saucepan of water to a boil and lower the tomatoes in, one at a time, for no more than 5 seconds. When the tomatoes are removed from the water, you should be able to slip the skins off. Then squeeze the seeds out and chop the pulp that remains. You should have about 1-1/4 cups. Put it into a small bowl.

Add the minced parsley, basil, and garlic.

Melt 2 tablespoons butter in a saucepan. Add the julienned celery, carrots, turnips, and leek. Before you julienne the vegetables make sure you wash the leek very carefully. They hold soil. Each hit of the julienne should be about 2 inches long and very, very thin.

Season with salt and pepper; then cover the pan. Over low heat sweat the vegetables for about 5 minutes or until they are soft.

While they are sweating, rinse the scallops and pat them dry.

I cooked and served this dish in scallop shells I got in France, but if you don't have them, you can use 4 small (3-inch) ramekins, the kind individual crèmes brûlées are often served in.

If you are making this dish for 4, arrange one-eighth of the vegetables in the bottom of each of whatever four containers you have chosen. Cover each with one-eighth of the tomato mixture, then arrange a quarter of the scallops over that. Season with salt and pepper; then cover with another one-eighth of the vegetables. Top everything with the last eighth of the tomato mixture.

Place the containers on a baking sheet or jelly roll pan and bake in the middle of the oven for about 5 minutes. This is ready when the liquid is bubbling and the scallops, if you can see them, have become opaque.

Carefully pour the liquid out of each shell or ramekin, then replace it on the baking sheet. Top each with a quarter of the remaining 1/2 tablespoon butter.

Return to the oven and bake for another 5 minutes or until the butter is bubbling.

Transfer the ramekins onto individual serving plates, fluff the contents with a fork then garnish each with a little chopped parsley.

Cooking for Madam
Recipes and Reminiscences from the
Home of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
By Marta Sgubin and Nancy Nicholas
Scribner
Hardcover, $30.00
ISBN: 0-684-85005-2
Recipe Reprinted by permission.