What exactly is a scallop?

Since Eric was in Chicago all weekend, he wasn't feeling like carbs or anything heavy for dinner.  I had originally planned on making mussels b/c it was cold and I thought the broth with crunchy bread would be delicious but then remembering "no carbs" I came up with a different plan of action.  Instead, I decided to make scallops.  Before, I would always bacon wrap them but I wasn't in the mood last night so I came up with something new instead.

For the scallops, I decided to make a white wine sauce to pair with them.  The ingredients were:

scallops

lemon juice

white wine

chicken stock (I ran out of wine)

garlic

parsley

butter

To make the sauce, you heat the white wine, then add chopped garlic, and lemon juice and let it reduce to about half.  I ended up adding some honey b/c I felt that it needed some sweetness to it.  Then once it's reduced, add the chopped parsley and butter and give it a stir.  It will thicken some once it cools and once the butter is added.  

For the scallops, I added olive oil and butter to the pan.  Once it was smoking hot, I added the scallops. I cooked them for about 1 min 30 sec per side and flipped them over and did the same on the other side. 

For the side, I went with brussel sprouts.  The ingredients that went into that dish were:

bacon

garlic

brussel sprouts

onions

lemon juice

parsley

salt

pepper

To start, I chopped up the bacon and cooked it in a pan.  Once it was cooked, I removed it from the pan but left the drippings.  Then added the onion and garlic and let that cook for about 2 minutes.  The brussel sprouts, I halved and cut into shreds and then added them to the pan.  I let the mix cook for a bit and then added the lemon juice, salt, and pepper.  Once it was all cooked, I put the bacon back in the pan and also added chopped parsley and gave it a toss.  

To serve, I added some parmesan on top of the brussel sprouts.  I poured the sauce onto the scallops and over the sprouts then topped the scallops with freshly cracked pepper.

This dish was great! The ingredients in the 2 dishes were so similar, making them compliment each other very well.  The sauce from the scallops tasted really good on top of the brussel sprouts.  The best thing about this dish is that is only takes about 10 minutes to make!  I decided to cook the brussel sprouts first since they can sit on the burner and stay heated just b/c I wanted to make sure I cooked the scallops properly but if you wanted to tackle them at the same time, it takes no time at all!  Even cooking them separately, dinner is done in less than 30 minutes.  This meal was more expensive to make than most mainly due to the cost of scallops but it was still cheaper than ordering scallops at a restaurant and I think better tasting than most I've had.