Before we even venture into the recipe, a couple of points. By salad cream I do not mean the disgustingly mayo-like and yellow or white-ish stuff you Brits squeeze/dollop/smear over your salad to dress it. Rather, I mean an actual cream made of boiled salad leaves. Secondly, I know you are used to sweet choux pastry, but its savoury counterpart is just as good.
For this recipe, please make sure to buy good quality scallops and to clean them thoroughly before use. Also, allow plenty of time to prepare and assemble everything. This recipe was featured in the March 2013 issue of La Cucina Italiana and works brilliantly as a canapé or starter when you have people over. Dead easy to make too!
Ingredients
- 1 quantity choux pastry
- 100ml double cream
- 6 big scallops
- 180g bag of mixed salad leaves, chopped
- 3 small artichokes from a tin/jar
- 30g butter
- 1 shallot, finely chopped
- parsley, finely chopped
- chives
- oil
- salt
- pepper
Method
- Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
- Prepare your choux pastry and pipe into small balls on the prepared tins. Bake as appropriate until the balls have puffed up and are a good golden brown.
- Remove from the oven and let them cool on a wire rack.
- Meanwhile, prepare the salad cream. In a frying pan, melt the butter and then tumble in the finely chopped shallot, mixing it until slightly golden. Add the salad leaves and let them wilt in the heat. As soon as they start leaking water, transfer them to a blender together with the cream and add 1 tsp chopped chives. Blend until smooth.
- Pour back into the pan and bring to the boil over medium heat, reducing it until slightly thickened. Season with salt and pepper and set aside.
- Sear the scallops in a very hot pan. Be careful not to overcook them. 2-3 minutes per sides will be more than enough. Transfer to a chopping board and, using a very sharp knife, slice into half.
- Finely chop the artichokes and mix together with the parsley and a dash of lemon juice. Season with pepper.
- Cut the choux profiteroles into half, then spoon some salad cream in the bottom half and top with some of the artichoke mixture. Arrange the scallop slice on top and cover with the choux bun top. Repeat with all of the choux buns.
Baking with Attitude 