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How to make scallops with sweetcorn cream and bacon

Melanie Johnson Melanie Johnson

Ideal for a fancy lunch or a special supper, this dish makes the most of some lovely ingredients you might not have seen together before. Popcorn and scallops, together at last!

‘Sweetcorn and butter are perfect companions in this pretty dish with scallops,’ writes our kitchen garden cook, Melanie Johnson, in this enticingly yellow dish

Recipe: scallops with sweetcorn cream and bacon

Ingredients

Serves four

  • 2 corn on the cob
  • 20g butter
  • 1tbspn olive oil
  • Half an onion, chopped
  • 1 clove garlic, grated
  • 150ml white wine
  • 75ml double cream
  • 2 rashers turkey bacon (or normal bacon)
  • ½tspn chilli flakes (to your taste)
  • 1tbspn chopped parsley
  • 12 scallops, roe removed
  • 10g salted popcorn
  • Fresh parsley to garnish

Method

Steam the corn cobs until just cooked. It takes about 10 minutes to steam them, but you could also simmer in boiling water for eight minutes. Set aside once cooked.

To a small saucepan, add the butter and olive oil, followed by the chopped onion. Cook over a low heat until soft. Add the grated garlic and the kernels from one of the cobs and increase the heat. Pour in the white wine and simmer until fully reduced. Add the splash of double cream and process in a blender until entirely smooth. Set aside in the pan until ready to plate or, if you’re cooking in advance, you could put it into a bowl, cover and chill until later.

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Finely dice the turkey rashers and add them to a small frying pan with a splash of oil (unless you’re using bacon, in which case you won’t need oil). Cook until browned and crispy and then add the chilli flakes and chopped parsley.

Tip this mixture into a separate bowl and, using the same frying pan, fry the other corn on the cob until it chars. Use a knife to slice off the kernels in clumps to arrange over the dish.

Still using the same pan, fry the scallops for a couple of minutes each side in foaming butter, making sure the pan is hot so that they take on good colour.

To serve, spread the plates with the hot sweetcorn cream, then arrange a few scallops on each and sprinkle everything with bacon, the charred sweetcorn, a few pieces of salted popcorn and, finally, some more fresh parsley.