RCP: Seared scallops with sauteed apples and vanilla sauce

This is great stuff. It's from John Ash's book, From the Earth to the Table. The sauce is really heavenly and could be used with chicken or perhaps something like cotechino sausage. I served this tonight with steamed rice. Went very nicely with a La Chablisienne '02 "Grande Cuvee".

Ingredients:

1 lb. fresh dayboat scallops (don't settle for anything less)
Salt & fresh ground pepper
1/2 c. chopped mushrooms
1/3 c. diced shallots or scallions (white part only)
4 T. clarified unsalted butter or olive oil
2 c. peeled, cored, and julienned tart green apples (Granny Smiths worked well)
1 1/2 c. dry white wine
2 1/2 c. rich fish stock (I cheated and used clam juice)
1 3-inch vanilla bean
1 c. heavy cream
1 t. Dijon mustard (or to taste - I was pretty heavy-handed with it)

(In Ash's book, he has an option for oven-dried apples as a garnish. I didn't do this and will leave them out)

Cooking it:

Remove and side muscle from the scallops. Rinse and dry them. Season gently with S&P and set aside.

In a saucepan over medium heat, saute the mushrooms and shallots in 2 T. of the clarified butter until they start to color. Add 1 c. of the apples, the white wine, stock, and vanilla bean, and reduce by half over moderately high heat, ~10 minutes. Add the cream and mustard and reduce to a light sauce consistency (this takes a little while). Strain the sauce, season to taste with S&P, and keep warm,

In a large saute pan over high heat, sear the scallops in the remaining 2 T. of butter for ~1 minute on each side. (DON'T OVERCOOK!) Remove the scallops and keep warm. Saute the remaining cup of apples until crisp-tender.

To serve, arrange scallops and apples on warm plates. Spoon over the sauce.

Mike, I'm going to try this simply to challenge my first impression. In my mind vanilla + apple = sweet . I can't get past that idea to think of how the rest of the ingredients influence the final taste. I understand how chicken might sub but cotechino which is very earthy, savory ?? Not challenging you in any sense -just showing you the limitation of my taste ideas in this reagrd.
I will have to do a sub because the scallops you mention are simply not available when I am.

Mike, I'm going to try this simply to challenge my first impression. In my mind vanilla + apple = sweet . I can't get past that idea to think of how the rest of the ingredients influence the final taste. I understand how chicken might sub but cotechino which is very earthy, savory ?? Not challenging you in any sense -just showing you the limitation of my taste ideas in this reagrd.
I will have to do a sub because the scallops you mention are simply not available when I am.

What's interesting about this is that the tartness of the apples really comes through while the vanilla is as much a scent thing as it is a flavor thing. (I think Ash calls it a "vanilla-scented sauce". What got me going on the cotechino idea was a cotechino-with-savory-custard dish from a Mario Batalli cookbook. We've had that one a couple of times and though it's a real heart attack of a recipe, it's really tasty. We have a couple in the freezer and some leftover sauce, so I may be able to give that a shot very shortly.

Two years ago while on vacation in the Tampa Bay area, I had a grilled grouper dish that had a vanilla sauce. I'm not much of a fish eater anyway, but the combo of fish, vanilla and sweet had me thoroughly upset with myself that I had blown the $$ on that dish, when the menu had plenty of other better options available.

Mike, I loved that you cheated and used clam juice for fish stock. I have been doing that for a while now and find my recipes turn out fine. I tried saving all those shrimp shells one time, among other fishy things....never again. So much easier to grab a nice bottle of a good clam juice!

Mike, I loved that you cheated and used clam juice for fish stock. I have been doing that for a while now and find my recipes turn out fine. I tried saving all those shrimp shells one time, among other fishy things....never again. So much easier to grab a nice bottle of a good clam juice!

That's my wife's shortcut. She said that back when she lived in Massachusetts, she didn't know anyone who made fish stock - they all used clam juice. I figured if it's good enough for them....

Glad to hear it from someone here, though.