Piccata is such a simple sauce that comes together quickly but produces extraordinary results. No need to wait until you visit your favorite Italian restaurant to order up this classic, you can easily make it at home!

The word piccata is translated to mean, tasty, savory, spicy and piquant, and that is so true because of the key ingredients of lemon, parsley and capers.

I've always made the classic piccata with chicken, and recently have come to love it with tilapia, but now my new favorite way is with scallops! Thanks goes to my friend Ciao Chow Linda, for giving me the inspiration! I can't believe I never made it with scallops before! It's all such a perfect pairing, if you haven't tried this yet, please do.

Hop on over to her delicious blog and check out her recipe, and pay close attention to searing your scallops, you'll want to make sure you get some good color on them.
I served mine with a side of angel hair pasta and extended my sauce a little by adding 1/2 cup of chicken broth.
Hope I've inspired you to give this dish a try, it was wonderful!

Buon Appetito!

I always keep a bag of frozen shrimp in my freezer, I like it for the convenience when I don't have time to run out and get fresh, it's easy to defrost, and it makes for a very quick dinner, and besides for a minimal amount of money I can get a few meals out of one bag. I think I paid $11.00 dollars for a 2 pound bag of jumbo cleaned and deveined ready to cook shrimp, you can't beat that! Here's a couple of my favorite ways to prepare it.

Bucatini with Shrimp and Roasted Tomato sauce
1.Roast your tomatoes at 400F till all of the juices burst out, remove from oven. I used those Campari tomatoes on the vine, cut in half drizzled with olive oil, S&P.
2.While tomatoes are roasting saute some shaved garlic in olive oil and toss your shrimp in there, remove when they're almost done.
3. Toss in some white wine, reduce a little and scrape all the tomatoes and every bit of the juices into the pan,
4. Add back your shrimp, toss in some chopped basil, and blend it all with your favorite pasta, bucatini works well with this.

Shrimp Aragonate

This is baked stuffed shrimp, with tons of flavor, this is a great dish for a party too. You can make a huge pan of these, or just a few, to go along with a steak as a surf and turf.

1.Preheat oven to 450F. Oil a large baking pan.

2.In a medium bowl, combine bread crumbs, fresh or panko, fresh parsley, and crushed garlic (don't be shy). Stir in olive oil to moisten the crumbs.

3.Arrange the shrimp single layer, curling each shrimp into a circle. Spoon a little of the bread crumb mixture onto each shrimp. Drizzle a little more olive oil on before baking.

4.Bake until the crumbs are browned and the shrimp are cooked through when cut in the thickest part, about ten minutes.

4.Serve hot or at room temperature, with lemon wedges.

Recipe adapted from, "Entertaining with the Soprano's"

Its been so nice to see and smell spring flowers popping up all over, here's some I have popping up around my house. I just love the smell of hyacinths!

Have a great week, and Buon Appetito!

If you love scallops, I'm certain you will love this dish! Every time I make it you will hear sounds like "Mmmmm!" "Oh, Wow!" "Yummm!" around my table, (me included).
Believe me, it isn't any skill on my part, it's very simple to make, it's just that the flavors go so well together. You have the intense concentration of the tomatoes which have been roasted, balanced with the sweet and slightly smoky flavor of the grilled scallops, added with it all, are those thin french beans that still have a little bite to them, I'm telling you, it's a match made in heaven!

The other great thing about this dish is the fact that the tomatoes and beans can be done ahead of time, even the day before. Scallops take no time at all, so I actually recommend you doing that, this way when the scallops are done, everything comes together so quickly.

Roasting the Tomatoes:

You must use those little tomatoes on the vine! I used the Campari ones from Costco, but you can get them almost any where. They have such terrific flavor already, and when you roast them they get even better. Take a foil or parchment lined baking sheet, cut each tomato in half, over a bowl lightly squeeze a little of the juice out, place cut side up , drizzle with olive oil, s&p, and crushed garlic. Roast in a hot 400 degree oven till they shrivel up and have a deep red color with still a little moisture.

Forgive me, I'm not sure how long it takes, I know its less than an hour and more than 20 min's.

Again it depends how much moisture is inside, just keep checking. Let them cool, and gently lift them off with a spatula and pack them into a container till ready to use.

Scallops:

Good quality scallops, big ones, that are dry, you don't want to put a wet scallop on the grill it just won't sear right. So place them between paper towels to get any moisture out. Toss them with some olive oil, salt and pepper, and cook them on a very hot grill and don't flip them till you get some good grill marks. I can't tell you exactly how long they take, it depends on how thick they are.

But don't over cook them OK!

French Beans:

Cook till crisp tender, rinse in cold water, put them into a Ziploc bag till ready to use.

Now when you're ready to eat, take a large saute pan, cook some shallots and more garlic in olive oil till tender. Now take your roasted tomatoes, place them in the pan and heat then gently through, as well as the beans.

When scallops are done, just incorporate everything together! That's it!

Buon Appetito!!!