I decided to post a more gourmet dish tonight, I hope you like it. I decided on pan seared scallops on a bed of arugula, garnished with diced beefsteak tomatoes with a crostini type bread, and a pistachio and cilantro sauce. Also there has been some confusion about whether or not these pictures are actually mine, and whether the final result is a plate I actually made, or whether I've pulled it off of a website from a recipe. I rarely use recipes while cooking, and havent yet on anything on this blog. However, if I ever do, I'll state it in the entry. I do, in fact, take all of the pictures on my blog as I'm making the dish, and the picture at the top of the post is the actual result that I made. Anyways, although this dish is a little more gourmet than some of my past posts, I'm pretty sure that if you follow the steps you'll be able to pull it off.
First, you want to take the shell off of about 1/4 of a cup of pistachios.
Run a rough chop through them after you have taken the shell off. This will help make it easier when we blend it.
Then, you want to spread them out on a cookie sheet and bake them at 400 degrees for about 5 to 10 minutes until they turn a slight golden brown. The reason we are roasting these is so that when we make a sauce out of them later, the flavor will be deeper, as well as richer.
After they are done cooking, they should look something like this.
Toss the toasted pistachios into a blender, and pulse it until they are all cut up into very small bits.
Next, run your knife through about 3/4 or a cup of fresh cilantro. Unfortunately, you cant use dried for this dish since the natural oils from the cilantro will help meld the parts of the sauce together. Then, run your knife through some fresh mint. You'll need about half the amount of cilantro that you used. Then, do the same with some parsley. You'll need about the same amount of parsley that you used of mint.
Take the juice of one fresh lime, and squeeze that right into the blender. You'll only need about a tablespoon or two, don't measure it perfectly, eyeballing the amount will suffice. Also add a pinch of dry mustard as well as cayenne pepper.
Add a few dollops of sour cream and 4 ice cubes and blend it together until smooth. It should look something like the above. The ice cubes are also beneficial since we're using sourcream, if you make this ahead of time, while you cook the rest of the meal it won't reach room temperature until you plate it. Don't be concerned if there are some little dots in there like you can see in the image above. It's because we're mixing solids with liquids and you can't make an emulsion out of these ingredients, but that's another day's post.
Next, you want to have a nice loaf of bread. It should be crusty on the outsite but still soft on the inside. A way to test this would be to just press lightly on the loaf, and the amount of pressure that it yields to tells you how crusty it is. A good option for this step would be focaccia bread, however my bakery had just taken these out of the oven and they looked perfect so I bought this instead.
Cut the bread into slices like this, make sure they aren't too big because will need to be able to balance on a pile, and be proportionate to the rest of the dish.
Cut a pad of butter for each slice of bread that you have just cut. Melt it until it gets small bubbles in it like pictured above. Place the bread, side down, and brown it until it's golden brown, tuen it over, and do the same to the other side.
It should brown up to look something like this. Make sure that your butter pads aren't too thick, or else the bread will become saturated and it wont crisp up into the typical crostini texture.
Once again, melt a few pads of butter, this time in a nonstick pan. Make sure it's a nonstick because scallops are so delicate, that when we sear it, if it sticks to the pan, it will tear and you wont be able to use it.
Arrange your scallops in a pan like this. If you have to do it in batches, then do that. Make sure that the scallops have room to breathe, meaning that they aren't touching. This is very important, especially when searing.
When the bottom of the scallop has browned to a point somewhat like this, flip it over until the other side looks like this. Try not to move them around too much, once again, because they are so delicate. If you have the temperature just right, you should only have to flip it once and both sides should be evenly cooked and browned.
Set them aside and work on your next batch.
Plate the food however you want, I chose to put the scallops on a bed of arugula with a garnish of diced tomatoes, with the sauce on the side of the plate. If you try it, let me know how you like it in the comments!
Until next time,
K
NONCOOKS LIFELINE:
Seared- see previous post, braised short ribs
Crostini- a type of bread sliced thin, then toasted.
Rough chop- a cut when you just run your knife over something, not too particular, just to break it down into some smaller pieces.
Pulse- to pulse something in a blender is when, rather than holding the button down continuously, you press it repeatedly until the food reaches the desired size or texture.
Focaccia bread- a flat, crusty, oven baked italian bread.
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