Creamy Pan-Roasted Scallops With Fresh Tomatoes
- Total Time
- 40 minutes
- Rating
- Notes
- Read community notes
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Ingredients
- 2tablespoons unsalted butter
- ¼cup thinly sliced shallots or red onion
- Pinch of celery seeds
- Salt and black pepper
- 2cups chopped fresh tomatoes
- ⅔cup dry white vermouth, dry white wine or clam juice
- 4teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
- 1cup heavy cream
- 2pounds sea scallops, patted dry
- ½cup chopped fresh chives, plus more for garnish
- ½cup chopped celery leaves or parsley leaves, or a combination, plus more for garnish
Preparation
- Step 1
Heat a large skillet over medium-high and add the butter, letting it melt. Add shallots, celery seeds and a pinch each salt and pepper, and cook until the shallots are tender and opaque, about 3 to 5 minutes. Stir in tomatoes. Bring to a simmer, stirring occasionally, and cook until jammy, 9 to 13 minutes.
- Step 2
Increase heat to medium-high and stir in vermouth. Cook until about a third of the liquid evaporates, about 5 minutes. Add Worcestershire and cream, and simmer, reducing heat if needed and stirring occasionally, until sauce thickens enough to coat a spoon, 5 to 7 minutes.
- Step 3
Season scallops with salt and pepper, and add to the pan. Cook, uncovered, until scallops are just cooked through and opaque, 3 to 6 minutes, depending on the size of the scallops. Stir in chives and celery leaves. Serve immediately, garnished with more chives and celery leaves.
Private Notes
Cooking Notes
a Mario Batalli tip - sear scallops on one side only, do not flip, remove from pan. When sauce done return scallops for only briefest of warmings. They're actually ready to eat after that one sided sear.
I'm curious about opinions on this recipe. I love a scallop with a good sear and in this recipe they are essentially poached. I'm thinking of searing my scallops and serving over the sauce. Thoughts? Anyone try this?
Although I understand you wanting to sear the scallops I think of this recipe more like making shrimp scampi. The scallops are going to cook in the sauce while absorbing more of that delicious flavor. Just my thoughts…
This is quintessential NYC Grand Central Oyster Bar! I can just see those men in starched white aprons and toques making it in their wondrously tiltable, gleaming copper pots behind the bar, steam rising, while I sip chilled Muscadet, Sancerre or Chablis. I am going to prepare this recipe for my 50th Anniversary this week.
The best substitute for the cream would be to make something else. And by the way Greek yogurt is no more healthy than cream. Any way you cut it this is not an everyday meal so have a healthy vegetarian meal day before and after and then enjoy this dish guilt free
IMHO, I think this sauce would be wonderful with shrimp and even sole or another thin mild fish. I’ll be trying this with fennel seed instead of celery seed as I’m not fond of the flavor. Serving it with shaved fennel and orange salad and using the fronds as the garnish in place of celery leaves.
Just follow the recipe. Poached scallops are divine. They are always done this way in Thai cooking, which I also do.
While I love scallops with a good sear, I followed this recipe exactly. The key is day boat fresh, dry sea scallops. The taste is more subtle than searing them but I thought this was one of the best scallop dishes I have eaten. BTW, I found the suggested cooking times uniformly a bit too long.
I would salt and pepper one side of the scallops then sear that one side of the scallops in butter with a couple tablespoons of rendered bacon fat. Once seared, but still raw, remove and plate the scallops. With the residual butter/fat, follow from Step 1 to the end. This provides the best of both seared and poached scallops with a little bacon flavor, which we all know has a flavor that is a match made in scallop & bacon heaven.
Add 2 ears fresh corn off cob when finishing sauce ....
If you have had this at the Grand Central Oyster Bar… You will know exactly what you are in for. Go to GCOB on a cold afternoon this fall and treat yourself to the oyster pan roast. Life changer.
Any ideas for a heavy cream substitute?
I was thinking the exact same thing.
The ease of preparation to excellence ratio for this dish is very high. I made the sauce 2 hours before dinner time, then heated it up, threw in the scallops and herbs (which I had prepared ahead of time). Incredibly easy! My guests and I were stunned at how good this was. Thanks, Melissa!!
exactly - I might cook the the shallots and the celery seeds first, remove, then sear the scallops, remove them and then proceed with the recipe, returning the seared scallops briefly at the end.
Excellent. Decadent! Rich & creamy! 1/2 red onion, 2 x packs scallops (defrosted in fridge) - pat dry!! White vermouth, used celery leaves & parsley, tsp fennel seeds instead of celery seeds 1 x tin tomatoes Make sauce in advance and do scallops @ end Served with toast and salad
I really appreciate these helpful notes. Here at a 6000' elevation lake in northern Utah, day boat scallops are not exactly easy to come by, but the grocery store frozen variety worked beautifully--even without searing--along with some leftover tomato-corn-garlic soup to sub for fresh tomatoes, chives from my herb garden, and a Riesling for the Vermouth. Over garlic-infused rice: stunning!
also can we talk about the fact that this is just scallops in swedish meatball sauce?
I definitely recommend this with bread, the sauce is very rich
I loved how simple this was. I would add less lemon juice, and simply add the zest—the lemon was a big strong and detracted from the overall flavor—I let like it was fighting with he prosciutto. I also added some greens at the end because we had lots of arugula in the garden that needed to be used, I enjoyed the added pepperiness and additional vegetable. Also topped with a light dusting of freshly grated Parmesan. Will definitely make again.
Holy smokes!! This was absolutely fantastic! Other than cutting the recipe in half (only 2 of us), and using a generous sprinkle of celery salt vs seed, didn't change a thing. I, too, was hesitant about not searing the scallops first, but glad I trusted the process! This is most definitely a dish worthy of company and will put it in immediate rotation.
This recipe is so delicious! My partner and I mopped up the rest of the sauce with bread after all the scallops were gone. Might add bacon/pancetta next time and finish it off with some squeezed lemon to cut the richness of the sauce a bit. Will definitely be making this again!
I love a good seared scallop, but just follow the recipe. This is one of the best scallop dishes I've eaten, ever, (I'm 71).
This felt very Spanish to me and I wanted a bit more zip, so I added a teaspoon of smoked paprika and finished with a drizzle of Pedro Jimenez aged vinegar. And served with a Rioja Reserva. Shazzam!
This was so good! I took the route of doing a quick initial sear, then adding back in to poach at the end. However, I was especially please to discover that this doubles as a wonderful tomato-cream pasta sauce! I followed the recipe as described, but never adding scallops. Instead, I grated in some Parmesan cheese and served over penne. So good.
Great recipe.
This was delicious. Followed the recipe as is but did brown the scallops first, then add to the sauce. Next time will double the sauce and serve over homemade pasta. Will definitely make this again and sent it to my daughter already.
I put this over linguine and it was divine.
This sauce is amazing and has lots of uses. You can do shrimp or some other seafood instead of scallops or you can use the sauce on your favorite pasta. Love it.
Add garlic after shallots. Last time I added pasta sand it went pretty well
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