Jalapeno Corn Soup with Seared Scallops

After getting back home from a two week long trip overseas I was dying to cook, bake, clean.  Basically all things domestic were calling my name.  I was also expecting to get home to some chilly fall weather here in Portland.  But as it turned out it's still fairly sunny and hot here so I decided to milk a little bit more summer fare out of the dwindling days.

As you can see here; I'm pretty into corn.  Especially summer corn.  So I saw this recipe and decided to go for it.  I also am such a novice when it comes to scallops.  I'd never even eaten a scallop until probably 3 years ago and I've never cooked them - until now.  Turns out they are super simple and the satisfaction you get from searing one off and seeing the caramelization is deeply gratifying.

I changed a couple of things on this recipe.  Mainly I used coconut milk instead of cream and subbed olive oil for the butter to make it dairy free.  I also cut down on one of the jalapeno peppers thinking it'd be too spicy but in retrospect that was a mistake so I've listed it back to the original two.  I hope you enjoy this, be it these last weeks of summer, or maybe save it for next year!

Jalapeno Corn Soup
adapted from Food 52

• 9 ears of corn, kernels removed and 4 cobs reserved
• 1 onion, diced
• 2 jalapeños, seeded and diced
• 3 cloves of garlic, peeled and minced
• 4 cups low-sodium chicken stock
• 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut milk
• 3 tablespoons oil
•  Salt and pepper

Melt the oil over medium heat in a large heavy pot or dutch oven. Add in the onion and jalapeño and cook for 5 to 7 minutes, or until soft but not brown. Add in the garlic and the corn kernels and cook for another minute or until fragrant, making sure that the garlic doesn't burn.  Pour in the chicken stock and coconut milk and add the corn cobs. Season with a few large pinches of salt and pepper. Bring soup to a boil, lower to a simmer, and cook for about 45 minutes.  Discard the cobs and blend the soup until smooth. Check for seasoning and add more salt and pepper if needed.  Ladle the soup into a shallow bowl and top with seared scallops. Soup can also be cooled and refrigerated for a few days or frozen for a couple months.

Seared Scallops

•     12 large sea scallops, preferably fresh and/or dry-packed
•     1 tablespoon olive oil
•     1 tablespoon neutral oil, like canola or grapeseed
•     Salt and pepper

Melt the butter and oil together in a large heavy skillet until very hot, but not smoking.  Rinse the scallops, pat very dry, and season generously with salt and pepper.  Add the scallops to the pan and cook for 2 to 3 minutes per side, or until caramelized on the outside and just slightly translucent in the center.

Gumbo - Portland Style

Even though the original recipe did not come from a Portlander I ended up thinking how quintessentially Portland this gumbo ended up being.  It's definitely not traditional and with the addition of quinoa instead of rice and oil instead of butter it felt healthier and a bit modernized.  While we really enjoyed the end product a lot I think there are a few additional tweaks I'd make for the next round but this recipe is a great jumping off point.

The dish wasn't too spicy but for those who want an extra kick you can easily add hot sauce or a spicy pepper to the bell pepper mix.  I personally loved the crab meat and shrimp in it but next time I will also add an Andouille sausage to round out the meat profile and to also kick up the spice.  For a week night meal I also love recipes where the chopping is kept to a minimum and this fits the bill with only one chopping step and the rest comes together in a cinch.

When I originally read the recipe I saw that one of the ingredients was file powder.  Now being someone who wasn't raised anywhere near the south I thought that was a misprint.  Then when preparing my shopping list I figured it was another name for some spice I probably already owned.  Boy was I wrong when I looked it up and discovered that file powder is a spicy herb made from dried and ground leaves of the sassafrass tree.  That was intriguing and I'm definitely going to try it out next time I prepare gumbo!

I changed some of the cooking times from the original recipe. Below as I made it.  Enjoy!

Seafood Gumbo
recipe adapted from here

1/4 cup canola oil
1/4 unbleached flour
3 small bell peppers, differing colors
1 gumbo seasoning packet or make your own
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 (14 ounce) can diced tomatoes
4 cups chicken broth
1 lb shrimp, peeled and de-veined
1 lb cooked crab meat
1 cup frozen okra
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup fresh parsley, chopped
3 cups cooked quinoa
file powder, for garnish

Dice up the bell peppers and set aside. Combine the oil and flour in a large soup pot or dutch oven over medium-low heat. Cook, whisking constantly, for about 10 minutes or until it's dark brown. Carefully add the bell peppers, okra, gumbo seasoning and cayenne pepper. Give it a good stir and let the vegetables cook for about 5 minutes or until softened.  Add the tomatoes and chicken broth, bring to a boil.

Start cooking your quinoa according the package instructions in a separate sauce pan.  Once the gumbo is boiling add the shrimp and cook for 5-7 minutes or until pink.  Add the crab meat and reduce to a simmer for 30 minutes or until thickened.  Remove from heat and add the fresh parsley.  Serve with cooked quinoa and file powder.

Watch:



Look:

Bouillabaisse

Happy new year! We are back with more soups than you can shake a stick at!

What better way to revive a blog than with a fresh makeover and a beautiful soup that is so much easier than the name would imply.  We noticed we did not really have any seafood recipes on this old blog, so we decided to jump into the fanciest sounding fish stew around, Bouillibaisse.  Here is our feedback on the outcome: 

Vanessa says:
Full disclosure - I'm not a huge fan of seafood and consider it my least adventurous side with it comes to eating.  Overall I think the best part of this soup was the broth.  There was something so rich about the subtle orange flavor and the saffron gave it the most beautiful color.  Even though I don't think we overcooked the fish it was still a bit rubbery for my liking, possibly because that was the only texture to the whole soup.  I found myself brainstorming ways to use this broth in other soups but without fish or maybe just less fish and other items added in.  However if you are a big seafood fan then you will think this soup is the bee's knees! 

Michelle says:
In contrast to Vanessa, I love seafood and I was excited to make this extravagant-sounding soup that I had never even eaten before.  Though it seemed a shame to strain everything out, the broth was amazing! So vibrant and fragrant, infused with citrus, herbs, and saffron.  I could have drank a gallon of this stuff.  If I made this soup again I would maybe add even more herbs, or just a different combination. Oregano seems to be used in this soup most often and when I was buying the herbs the store was out of oregano! So I grabbed tarragon and marjoram in its place.  I agree with V that the texture of this soup was not the most interesting or varied, but I still loved it. Maybe a different combo of seafood would make a difference. Adding some potatoes after straining but before adding the fish would be a good way to bulk up this soup if you did not want bread or if you just wanted a heartier stew.


We used this recipe from Steamy Kitchen as a starting point, and here is the recipe as we made it:

Bouillabaisse
Serves 6

Ingredients:
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 leek, white and light green parts only, chopped
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
peel of 1 orange (a vegetable peeler works great)
3 tomatoes, chopped
1/3 cup chopped fennel bulb (reserve fronds for garnish)
a bunch of fresh herbs (we used parsley, thyme, tarragon, and marjoram)
1/2 teaspoon saffron threads, crushed
10 cups fish stock (see original post for help making your own fish stock)
1 cup dry white wine
1 tablespoon sea salt
3 pounds of assorted fish and shellfish (clams and mussels scrubbed clean). We used 1 lb clams, 1 lb petrale sole, 1/2 lb prawns, and 1/2 lb sea scallops. Other options would be salmon, lobster, crab, mussels, bass, etc.

Seriously isn't this the most gorgeous pile of ingredients?? The fish was also beautiful and I am a little sad we did not take a proper photo of it, especially the clams!


Directions:
1. In a large stockpot, heat the olive oil on medium heat.  When hot, add the leek, onion, and garlic.  Saute for 5 minutes until onions are softened but not brown.

2. Add to the pot the orange peel, tomatoes, fennel bulb, fresh herbs, saffron, wine, fish stock, and salt.  Turn the heat to high and bring to a boil.  Then turn the heat to low and simmer for 30 minutes.  Strain the soup into another large pot.

3.  Bring the strained soup to a boil over medium high heat.  Taste the broth at this point and add additional salt if needed.  The soup should be slightly salty, as this adds to the flavor of the fish.

4. Add in the seafood, adding in the items that require the most cooking time first.  If you have whole lobster tails or large crab claws, add them in first and give them a 2 minute head start.  Clams come next, then mussels and extra large shrimp, lastly the fish, scallops, and any smaller shrimp.  Be careful not to overcook the seafood. This should take about 4 to 5 minutes and then turn off the heat.

5.  Ladle this glorious soup into each bowl with the seafood and garnish with fresh fennel fronds.  Ooh and aah as you slurp. And don't forget to get some delicious rustic bread to dunk in the broth!

Here is a quick video of how this process went:

Enjoy!