Facibus Reviews

This recipe is adapted from one that Stephanie Alexander wrote in The Cook’s Companion (one of my favourite cookbooks of all time). It serves two people as a main or four as an entree.

Brown a finely chopped onion in a tablespoon of olive oil. Add a 425gm tin of chopped tomatoes. Add whatever herbs you have from this list: basil, thyme, rosemary, oregano, as well as some salt and pepper, and cook until the tomatoes are a nice salsa-y consistency. To the tomato mixture add a chopped red capsicum, two cloves chopped garlic and two sticks of celery. Cook until the celery starts to soften.

Heat a separate pan - when hot add a tablespoon of olive oil. When very hot add 500gm scallops out of the shell (the Coles supermarket frozen ones, while not as good as fresh, certainly serve in this faux cuisine version) and sear for not more than one minute, turning gently two to three times. Pour in 1/4 cup white wine. Not more than a minute later, add the tomato/vegetable mixture and stir through, cooking for not more than one additional minute (in other words, the scallops are not cooked for more than 2 1/2 minutes total). Serve immediately in big bowls.

Stephanie recommends serving it with toast - we rarely eat carbohydrates of an evening so usually avoid bread, but I think it would be a good accompanyment. She also recommends making the tomato sauce from scratch using fresh tomatoes - this would be a nice touch in the summer/autumn.