90. Scallops in Chafing Dish

This was a fail.

Is it wrong for me to just, right off the bat, say that? Does that just kill the suspense and you’ll stop reading right now? Well, I’ll take that chance. Let’s see how I got there.

#90 started out promisingly because I had another lovely produce crate from Arganica. I used the green leaf lettuce from the crate to make the Green Pea Salad with Sour Cream Dressing. I made this the day before.

Now, for those of you who have been with me on my journey from the beginning, you may remember meal #54 Shrimp Creole and the Pea & Celery Salad in Lettuce Cups with Cucumber Mayonnaise.  Well, if you don’t remember it, this may refresh your memory:

It was gross. One of the grossest things I have ever made. Since these 2 dishes have very similar names, I was fearing the worst. But unlike the time with the Pea & Celery salad, I consulted some cookbooks and then came up with my own version.

Green Pea Salad with Sour Cream Dressing

• 2 scallions
• 2 cups torn lettuce
• 10 oz frozen peas
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1/2 cup mayo
• Parmesan cheese
• 1 oz bacon bits

Line the bottom of a bowl or container with the scallions and lettuce. Top with defrosted peas. Combine the sour cream and mayo and cover the peas with the mixture. Sprinkle with the Parmesan cheese and top with bacon bits.

I used Bacos. 1 ounce is a shit-ton of Bacos.

Fast forward to dinner day.

5:45pm: I put together the Fresh Tomato Rice. I used fresh basil, scallions instead of regular onion and I switched  chicken bouillon cubes for broth.

6:11pm: The Rice is in the oven so I go about getting the other ingredients ready–and drinking white wine. I love it when wine is one of the ingredients: a half cup to you, half a bottle to me!

6:47pm: I put the bouillon (I used canned beef broth) on the stove to heat and took a look-see at the rice, which was cooking quite nicely. It looked fluffy and well on its way. And with that it was time to start the scallops!

I do not have a chafing dish (does anyone own a chafing dish? What kind of cooking would one have to do with regularity that would necessitate the ownership of a chafing dish?); however every time I think of a chafing dish I think of This (click on it. You know you want to).

But I do own an electric skillet, so chafing dish or no, I was able to forge ahead.

The scallops themselves were quite nice. They were organic, from Arganica. This recipe and cooking method was simple enough, but sometimes it’s the simplest recipes that are killers. I dunno if it was because I only used 1 pound of scallops instead of 2 and the amount looked scant in my big skillet, or because I don’t know how to use the temperature control on my electric skillet, or I just can’t discern when scallops have lost their transparency.

But these little bay scallops were overcooked.

Oh well.

7:10pm: Dinner is Served!

My poor, little, rubbery, overcooked scallops. Don’t they look positively sad in that big skillet? The sauce, which was so simple, wasn’t enough to overcome the texture. And the taste–they came off as really fishy. #90 would’ve been great had I prepared it correctly, but as it stood: Fail.

The fresh tomato rice was palatable, but to be quite honest, it tasted just like Rice-a-roni. Not worth chopping and peeling: Fail.

The weird soup. Avocado in Beef Broth. I will allow Brian to speak for me:

The pea salad? Eh. I will admit that this was edible (which I cannot say for the previously mentioned Pea & Celery Salad in Lettuce Cups with Cucumber Mayonnaise). But I cannot say that I liked it, either. It was just weird.  Peas in mayo and sour cream is weird. Bacos are weird, unnaturally red, and contain no animal meat or oils. Pleae see below photo for how I feel about that:

And how the lettuce did not get soggy underneath all of the other ingredients will forever remain a mystery to me. Fail.

There was one highlight of #90: Angel Lush filled angel food cake. This recipe is on Cool Whip containers:

Mix pineapple and dry pudding mix in medium bowl with whisk until well blended. Stir in COOL WHIP.

Angel Lush. For some reason the words  totally remind me of the “Turn Back The Hands of Time” motorcycle heaven scene from Grease 2. It’s the song where Michelle Pfeiffer does a lot of slow motion running and spinning like she’s in a tampon commercial while donning a Clash of the Titans toga thingie and Maxwell Caulfield looks like a Tin Man Speed Racer leatherdaddy. This song is deliciously awful. I implore you to watch this if you haven’t already seen it. Or crap, even if you have seen it, you know you want to see it again.

I know that the general consensus is that original film is far-superior, but I find this one more watchable. When Grease 2 is on TV I drop everything and just sit there, mesmerized. What on Earth is more amazing than choreographed bowling? Plus, I would take Michael Carrington/Cool Rider over Danny Zuko any day–Cool Rider’s sideburns alone make me swoon.

Also, I covet Stephanie Zinone’s entire wardrobe (sans Grecian goddess dress).

But anyway, Angel Lush. I made the lush as directed, but instead of baking my own cake, I used one from the store. I used a big serrated knife to cut it into 3 parts and then alternated the cake and the filling to make a layer cake. The key was that I assembled the cake in the container that I bought it in. I lined it with saran wrap, put it all together, topped it with the lid, and then that’s how I refrigerated it. This worked like gangbusters.

My Angel Lush cake:

It’s not the prettiest cake by any means, but at least the container kept it all together. If I really wanted to I could have iced it to make it more visually appealing, or garnished it with the strawberries, but I wasn’t trying to impress anyone.

This tasted good and the container made taking it to work extra-easy.

So at least in this meal of fail there was a glimmer of win.

One last thing: have a very, very, happy and hearty Thanksgiving. Don’t worry, although I will be on break, I will still be getting in on the holiday action. Can anyone say Tuna-Herring Spread?