Scallop coral

Corail de Saint-Jacques

What it is

The great scallop is a simultaneous hermaphrodite, and the comma of coral is one organ carrying both halves: the orange ovary and the cream-white testis fused along a single curve. American boats shuck it off at sea and throw it away; French kitchens buy it by weight and dry it for powder.

In the kitchen

Salt it, dry it at 70 °C until brittle and grind it — a spoonful of coral powder gives a sauce more scallop flavour than the muscle ever will. Cooked whole it goes grainy, so thirty seconds in a hot pan and no more.

Goes with

Scallop Butter Cream Leek Saffron Dry vermouth Shallot

Same species

Scallop

In season alongside

Belon flat oyster Ikura King crab Olive Sea urchin Violet sea squirt

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