Coquilles Saint Jacques and Souffle

mad max beyond eggdome

a FB friend (who i'm working on getting to drink the BGE kool aid) was talking about pitching some scallop shells (i offered to take them off her hands as they could join my 40 year old escargot shells) and by the time we finished 'talking' she had decided to keep her's. ..but then a few days later, lo and behold a box showed up at my door from some kitchen store in the midwest with a dozen scallop shells from her!!! damn i love friends!!! so last night it was french night here at the house. ...classic coquilles saint jacques and a cheese souffle. .. all done on the eggs for that classic rustic flavor i like so much. ...i hadn't made scallops like this in probably 25 years (souffles i've done a lot)... .

to do it up right i went down the street to the good fishmonger and brought really good quality scallops and a container of fish stock for the velote sauce.. ..

as i like to do, i read through about 3 or 4 different recipes from the likes of julia child, jacque pepin and anthony bourdain, took those recipes and mixed and matched the elements i liked and tweaked them further with a few of my own ideas. ..the results came out really good. ...

here are the scallops.... brushed with some melted butter and lemon juice and seasoned with a little dizzy pig shaking the tree (the lemon/pepper mix took it up a notch beyond just salt and pepper)....



grilled quickly on the egg just to brown them, but get them about halfway done as they'd be baked more later in the shells and i didn't want them to get over cooked. ..



i then sauted some mushrooms and shallots in butter



next up the velote sauce.. ..classic recipe from julia child....few tablepoons of flour and butter, whisked till smooth, then added 1/2 a cup of the fish stock and reduces until smooth .. .then added a cup of heavy cream and some salt and pepper. . .kept whisking until really smooth. ..tasted unbelievably good!!....



slice the scallops in thin slices and laid them and mushrooms/shallots onto the shells, then spooned the velote sauce on top of them, then topped it all off with a little gruyer cheese... .



then into a 550 degree egg indirect until the sauce/cheese was bubbling and starting to brown. ...about 5 - 8minutes or so. . .



while all this was going on, i had made up jacque pepin's momma's souffle recipe. ..i like this one cause you don't have to separate the egg yolks from the whites. .. it doesn't rise as high as a regular souffle, but its easy peasy and tastes just as good!!

here it is on the egg and then finished





and here it is all plated. .. .along with some green beans, blanched then tossed with some bacon. ..



it was a great meal. ...a good clean egg gave these dishes a really nice rustic flavor .. ..you don't want smoke or any grease in the egg as it would definitly affect the flavor of the cream sauce and the cheese in the souffle. ...

Doug in Eggmonton

That looks fabulous Max, Definitely on the list.

Thanks

Doug

thirdeye

Nice Max. I have a box of those in my basement, might have to break them out.

Ripnem

Wow does that look great, Max.

Bookmarked

eenie meenie

Max, your Coquilles Saint Jacques looks divine. It's one of my favorites. I'll have to try whipping up a souffle, haven't done one in quite while. Thanks for the inspiration.

Little Steven

Max,

Really, really nice! I have a recipe that I will type out and send to you that is absolutely amazing. It was done in a book by Seagrams distilleries and uses a white wine and rum base. My Mom adapted it for crepes but it is the best coquilles flavour I have ever tried. I have wanted to try it on the egg for years.

Steve

elzbth

Yummmmm - looks darned good!!!

Doug in Eggmonton

Hey Steve:

Could you send that my way too? I'd appreciate it.

Doug

mad max beyond eggdome

thanks doug, it was good...will be doing it again. ..next time i'll go a little lighter on that last bit of cheese though, just a sprinkle would have been perfect...

mad max beyond eggdome

yep, time to bring them up from the basement for sure!!. .my friend certainly inspired me!!

mad max beyond eggdome

thanks adam. ...even if you don't have the shells, you could do it as a single dish in a shallow casserole or ramakins . . .

Little Steven

Doug,

I will too. All my cookbooks are still packed but I will get to it asap. This one had the delicate flavour of the scallops enhanced by de-alcoholised rum and white wine. Very good and one of the few recipes I have ever followed.

Steve

mad max beyond eggdome

rebecca, you can never go wrong with a good souffle. ..easy and delicious!!

and divine is a good word to describe that velote sauce... it was smooth and rich with the scallops.. .really nice!!

mad max beyond eggdome

it sounds great steve!!....one thing i noticed is that there are no limits to the number of variations on the velote sauce recipes. .. i'd like to see your's as well. ...most actually had a poaching wine (or champagne) basee, but since i didn't poach my scallops, i didn't use any. ..i can certainly see adding some brandy or other liquour as well. ..

mad max beyond eggdome

thansk a lot . ..it was

Little Steven

Max,

Never mind all this cooking stuff. When does pre-season start? Got our tickets last week and haven't had time to look.

Steve

Boss Hogg

Max, You'd find something like that in only 1 or maybe two restaurants in Berks County. It looks yummy.
Brian

mad max beyond eggdome

LOL...caps rookie camp starte yesterday. ... full camp starts next sunday. .. with scrimages next week...their training facility is about 1 mile from my house, so i'll be going there at lunch time some days.. .not sure when the first pre-season games are, but i'll go to one or two for sure. .. .

we took a pass on the winter classic though. . .the seat prices were absurd. .. .they offered us two seats up in the nose bleeds at heinze field for 180 bucks a ticket. ..that plus a 4 hour drive each way to pittsburgh on news year day. ..we took a pass. ...we'll be at the beach and we'll find a bar and watch on tv!!

mad max beyond eggdome

thanks brian. ... thats why you have to simply make it yourself. ....1/4 the price of what you'd pay in the restaurant, and every bit as good (or better)...

Gator Bait

 
Fantastic cook Max and a great looking menu. I haven't seen a fish monger that carried stock in many years. If I needed it I would have to make my own which is easy enough. Great post thanks for sharing.

Blair

 

mad max beyond eggdome

thanks blair... this guy i go to is right down the street from is very old school...unfortunately is also very expensive, so i only go there rarely and when i really want the very best product. .. .but he takes all of his waste and makes his own stock to sell....it was really intense flavored stuff...

Gandolf

Nice cook, Max! Great post.

Frank from Houma

Beautiful. Looks like a dinner at a five star restaurant in New Orleans.

I feel like I need to leave a tip after looking.

mad max beyond eggdome

LOL.. .tips are always frank!!!

mad max beyond eggdome

thanks dave. . .this one goes in the books for special nights in the future, thats for sure.. .pretty easy with great results. ..

BobS

That is some XXX food porn for sure. I gotta do that.

I am pretty sure I have that soufflé recipe and I sure like the look of those scallops

mad max beyond eggdome

the souffle recipe is the one from jacque pepin's book 'the apprentice' about growing up through the kitchen's in france. ...its his mother's recipe. . like i said, the nice thing about it is you don't have to separate the yolks and whites ....very easy. ..

BobS

I found the recipe and surprise surprise, it was one of your posts!

Thanks for the inspiration.

mad max beyond eggdome

LOL. ..yep, i've posted that souffle probably a couple of times in the past .. . one of my favorites .. .hopefully i was consistent!! . ...

Gator Bait

 
He sounds like good man. I used to make my own fish stock, the local fish market would give me for free the left over racks from grouper and snapper. It's just like any other stock except it doesn't need to simmer as long. A bowl of it in the frig over night would turn to thick Jello and would be ready for some great fish chowder. Now the fish monger charges for the racks and cooking for just one it isn't practical but I do miss those chowders.

Blair

 

mad max beyond eggdome

well, it cost me 5 bucks for a pint of the stuff. ..like i said, this guy ain't cheap, but he is gooood!! ...and it was some thick gelatin!!!