Scallops with three peas and prosciutto, except not at all

From the Chicago Tribune, originally from a cookbook called “Blue Eggs and Yellow Tomatoes” by Jeanne Kelley.

My mom and I made this on my last night in Chicago, before I flew back to San Francisco and all the baby birds left the coop for good. I suppose the most apropos dish would have been two tiny baby Cornish hens with a bunch of ducks in a row on opposite ends of the table, to symbolically represent my sister’s big move to New York and my decision to stay in the Bay Area, but frankly, that would have been a little fowl.

Ahahaha. You come here for the food, stay for the jokes, etc.

This is supposed to be made with prosciutto, but you know how soft prosciutto is, and then when it’s cooked it’s all like little tiny fragmenty salty chards? It just doesn’t really stand up next to the firm texture of the scallops.

Plus, then the rest of your cheap prosciutto (you’re probably buying this on the cheap if you’re reading this blog) will just dry out in your fridge after you gag down a slice of it wrapped around some unripe melon. Take it from me, take it all away.

You all have a pound of bacon in your freezer, right? Or a pig out in the backyard? Do what’s best for you. Sooo-eeeee.

Click below for more pictures

This recipe is kind of bowl-and-pan-and-time consuming. Make it for your special lady, or ladies.

Serves 4. Yes, y’all get a half pound of scallops, and you get a scallop, and you get a scallop. The nice thing about cooking at home is that if your mother is going to spend $26 on 2 pounds of scallops at Costco, at least everybody gets at least 6-9 HUGE ones to themselves, unlike at restaurants, when you get 3 medium-to-meh ones for $24.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup fresh or frozen peas
• 1 cup sugar snap peas or Chinese Snow Peas or BOTH go NUTS
• 1 tablespoon
• 1 large shallot, minced
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme
• 1 cup dry white wine
• 4 cups chopped baby spinach (or pea shoots or fava leaves)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• freshly ground pepper
• 2 pounds large sea scallops (defrosted), well drained and patted down a million times with paper towels
• 4 raw slices of bacon, chopped or scissored

1. Bring a medium-to-large pot of salted water to boil and add your snappy/Chinese peas. Boil those for 2 or 3 minutes, then add your round peas, cook for a minute, drain. Don’t worry about flashing them with ice water or anything. You’re not Thomas Keller. You don’t have time for this. Unless you are Thomas Keller, then by all means. Arrange on 4 oven-safe plates in a nest formation (yes, a nest), with a hole in the middle. You’ll be putting your sauteed spinach in the hole later.
   
   
2. Cook chopped bacon in a large heavy skillet over medium heat. When crisp, remove bacon with a slotted spoon, place on some paper towels, and pour half of the bacon fat into a heat-proof vessel of some sort.  Leave the other half of bacon fat in the pan.
   
   
3. Once you’ve removed the bacon, add the minced shallot and cook until golden, about 3 minutes. Add the garlic and thyme and cook for 1 minute. Add the wine, cook for 3 minutes until the alcohol has cooked off, then transfer the mixture to a microwave-safe small bowl or Pyrex.
   
   
4. Put half of the reserved bacon fat (you did read step #1, right) into that same pan. Do not switch pans. No need. Put your baby spinach or pea shoots or fava leaves in there, stir until just wilted, season with salt and pepper, remove with slotted spoon and place in the middle of your pea-mixture-nest. Move the plates to the warmed oven.
   
   
5. Heat 1 tablespoon olive oil in the same skillet over high heat
   heat. Add scallops, make sure the pan isn’t too crowded. Cook until scallops are browned on both sides, turning once, about 2-3 minutes per side for the scallops. Salt them after you sautee them, these babies are usually frozen and thus like to make things a soupy mess inside the skillet.
   
   
6. Using tongs, arrange the scallops atop the pea mixture on the plates that you’ve warmed in the oven. You may want to put these plates on top of other plates so you don’t hurt yourself. And then put those plates on plates. And then put those plates on chargers, next to an unmanageable fake hydrangea bouquet. Nuke the wine sauce for 30 seconds. Pour over scallops, sprinkle the bacon and serve.