Scallops and chorizo in a garlic cream sauce

Scallops are one of the most popular dishes I have cooked, they can be found all over the world including Weymouth and Portland, they can be found in the intertidal zone or the deep sea and they have very easily recognisable shells. I have spent a lot of time in the past getting scallops from their shells and the shells are very handy to keep too, they can be used as dishes to serve the scallops in and I have even seen them used as ashtrays. I have a couple of friends who like to go diving for scallops and a couple of times I have been bought a couple to cook, not that when they are that fresh they need to be cooked.

 

There are so many different ways to cook scallops and things to serve them with, I especially like them with black pudding and a pea puree or as a surf n turf with a nice rare fillet steak, but today I want to share my scallops and chorizo recipe with a garlic cream sauce. This is only a fairly small dish as its quite filling but you could make it into a larger course by simply doubling the ingredients. This dish is so tasty and I would definitely recommend getting some nice bread for the sauce.

Ingredients:

3 fresh medium sized scallops

A couple of slices of chorizo

¼ small white onion diced

1 small clove garlic pureed

150 ml double cream

Large pinch of paprika

Large pinch of curly parsley chopped

1 tbsp butter

1 tsp oil

Method:

Start off by melting the butter with the oil in a pan on a low heat, once heated turn it up a little so it is on a medium heat then once hot add onion, garlic and scallops.

Next add the chorizo and check the scallops, once they have started to brown on the bottom turn them over and cook them on the other side, then add the parsley and paprika.

Once the scallops are just about brown on both sides add the cream and turn the heat up a little a little and season the pan, keep stirring to ensure the scallops or chorizo do not stick to the pan, reduce the cream by about a quarter.

Finally when dishing up make sure you have a big enough bowl for all the sauce as trust me you do not want to waste a drop. When I make it at work for other people I always have someone around with a chunk of bread waiting for me to put the pan down so they can dig in.