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Scallops in Shell
1 pint scallops 2 tablespoons butter 1 tablespoon Gold Medal flour Yolks of 3 eggs 1 cup drained liquor 4 tablespoons bread crumbs 1 slice onion 1/2 teaspoon salt Few grains cayenne Drain the scallops, toss them with a tablespoon of butter in a sauce-pan, letting them brown lightly for about ten minutes. Drain from the butter and chop fine. Melt 1 tablespoon of butter, add the onion minced fine and brown it lightly, add the flour, cook together and stir in slowly the scallop liquor. Mix the chopped scallops with the bread crumbs and seasonings and add to the sauce. Beat the yolks lightly, add to the mixture and cook together for three minutes. Fill the shells, sprinkle fine bread crumbs over the top, dot with bits of butter and brown in a hot oven for ten minutes.
A gratin of chopped scallops bound with an egg-enriched veloute, in the manner of coquilles St. Jacques. The recipe assumes a great deal more scallop liquor than a modern package will give you.
- The liquor problemA pint of scallops today, whether sea or bay, will drain perhaps a quarter cup of liquid rather than the full cup called for. Make up the difference with fish stock, bottled clam juice or milk, or the sauce will be too stiff to fill the shells.
- Hot ovenRead "hot oven" as 425-450F. Ten minutes at that heat is enough to set the crumb topping and brown the butter; the filling is already cooked.
- The egg yolksThree yolks stirred into a hot sauce will scramble if the pan is at a boil. Keep it below a simmer for the three minutes given, and pull it off the heat the moment it thickens.
- Ten minutes of browningScallops seared for a full ten minutes go rubbery. Because they are chopped fine and bound in sauce here the texture matters less than it would in a whole scallop, but two to three minutes over good heat gets the same browning without the squeak.
- Gold Medal flourPlain all-purpose flour. The brand name is house advertising; nothing about the recipe depends on it.
- Few grains cayenneA pinch, and a small one. It is there for warmth behind the egg-thickened sauce, not for heat.
- The shellsThe recipe assumes scallop shells were on hand and says nothing more about them. Shallow ramekins, small gratin dishes or ovenproof coquille dishes do the same job.
- YieldThe recipe does not say. The quantity will fill roughly four to six shells.
The Gold Medal Flour Cook Book was published by Washburn-Crosby of Minneapolis, the milling firm that later became General Mills, and like most such books it existed to put the company's flour into as many dishes as possible, including this one, where a single tablespoon thickens the sauce. The dish itself is an Americanized coquilles St. Jacques, the French preparation of scallops returned to their shells with a sauce and browned crumbs; the scallop shell is traditionally associated with pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. The recipe's unexplained instruction to 'fill the shells' suggests the shells needed no comment for its readers.