Creole Scallops with Collards, Mustard Greens, and Toasted Benne
Sea scallops seared hard and set over two kinds of greens braised down with lentils, sweet pepper, and celery, finished with toasted benne seeds and vinegar.
Why You'll Love This Recipe
This is what happens when a pot of greens and a plate of seared shellfish end up in the same bowl, which along the Gulf they often do. Collards give the pot structure and mustard greens give it the horseradish bite that keeps a bowl of greens from tasting flat, and cooking them together is much better than either on its own. Lentils go in because they soak up the pot likker and turn a side dish into lunch. The whole thing takes half an hour, and most of that is the greens cooking down while you do nothing.
Benne is what sesame is called across the Lowcountry and the Gulf, carried over by West Africans and grown there for three centuries, and toasting the seeds dry in the skillet before anything else happens is the step I would not skip. They go nutty and they stay crunchy on top of soft greens, which is exactly the contrast the bowl needs. Scallops come last, and they need a hotter pan than most people give them. Dry surface, hot metal, ninety seconds, and do not touch them, or you will get pale rubber rather than a crust.
I like this for lunch because it is substantial without being rich, and because it holds up on a second day better than most seafood does. The greens are better the next afternoon, honestly. There is enough here to be the whole meal, and the vinegar at the end does what vinegar always does in a pot of Southern greens, which is cut through and make you want the next bite. Serve it with a lemon wedge and let people squeeze it themselves.
Ingredients
- 10 oz large sea scallops (about 12), small side muscle pulled off, patted very dry
- 1/2 large bunch collard greens (about 9 oz leaves), stems cut out and leaves sliced into ribbons
- 1 bunch mustard greens (about 9 oz leaves), stems cut out and leaves sliced into ribbons
- 1 cup cooked brown lentils, drained
- 1/3 cup benne seeds, which are sold most places as hulled sesame seeds
- 1 3/4 tbsp olive oil
- 2 celery stalks, cut into small dice
- 1/2 red bell pepper, cut into small dice
- 1/2 medium yellow onion, finely chopped
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 2 tsp smoked paprika
- 2 tsp fresh thyme leaves, stripped from the stems
- 1/4 tsp cayenne, or more if you like it hot
- 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- 2 tbsp lemon juice, from 1 lemon, plus wedges for serving
- 4 scallions, sliced thin
Instructions
- Toast the benne seeds: Put the sesame seeds in a dry 12-inch skillet over medium heat and toast them for three to four minutes, shaking the pan often, until they turn golden and start to smell like popcorn and hop around a little. Tip them onto a plate right away, since they keep darkening in a hot pan and go bitter in under a minute.
- Start the trinity: Add the olive oil to the same skillet over medium heat and cook the onion, celery, and bell pepper for four minutes, stirring, until the onion is translucent and the celery has lost its squeak. Add the garlic, smoked paprika, thyme, and cayenne and cook forty five seconds more, until the spices smell toasted.
- Cook the greens down: Add the collard and mustard ribbons in three additions with a quarter cup of water, letting each batch wilt before the next goes in. Cover and cook over medium for six to seven minutes, stirring twice, until the collards are tender enough to fold without snapping and the mustard greens have turned deep olive. Stir in the lentils and the vinegar and cook two minutes uncovered, until the liquid has cooked down to a glaze. Move it all to a bowl and cover.
- Sear the scallops: Wipe the skillet, set it over high heat, and let it get very hot, about two minutes, because a scallop laid into a pan that is not properly hot sticks fast and tears when you turn it. Lay the scallops in flat side down, spaced apart, and do not move them for ninety seconds to two minutes, until a deep brown crust has formed and they release on their own. Turn them and cook forty five to sixty seconds more. They should feel like the pad of your thumb, springy rather than firm, and the centers should still be slightly translucent.
- Build the bowls: Divide the greens and lentils among four shallow bowls and set three scallops on each. Add the lemon juice to the hot skillet, swirl for five seconds to lift the browned bits, and pour that over the scallops. Scatter the toasted benne seeds and the scallions across everything and serve with lemon wedges.
Variations
- With okra: Add a cup of sliced okra with the trinity and cook it hard for three minutes first so it browns rather than turns slippery.
- Smoked turkey pot likker: Cook the greens in a cup of broth rather than water for a deeper, rounder pot.
- Black-eyed peas: Use black-eyed peas in place of the lentils for something closer to a New Year plate.
- Extra hot: Stir a teaspoon of hot sauce into the greens along with the vinegar, which is how it usually arrives at the table down there.
- Corn and tomato: Add half a cup of corn kernels and a handful of halved cherry tomatoes in the last two minutes for a late summer version.
Storage & Leftovers
The greens and lentils keep four days in a sealed container and improve overnight, the way any pot of Southern greens does. Store the scallops separately and the toasted seeds in a jar on the counter, since anything crunchy that sits in the refrigerator with wet greens stops being crunchy by morning.
Reheat the greens in a covered skillet over medium with a splash of water, four or five minutes, and add a fresh drop of vinegar at the end to wake them back up. Warm the scallops only briefly on top of the greens with the lid on, thirty to forty seconds, because a second sear turns them tight and chalky.
The greens and lentils freeze well for up to three months in flat sealed portions, and having a bag of them in the freezer is the reason I sometimes make a double batch. Scallops do not freeze once cooked, so sear those fresh and set them on greens you thawed overnight in the refrigerator.
Notes & Tips
- Toast the seeds first, in a dry pan: Doing them before anything oily goes in means you can see the color change, which is the only reliable signal you get.
- Pull the side muscle: That little rectangular tab on the side of a scallop stays tough no matter how you cook it. It peels off with your fingers in a second.
- Cook the two greens together, not in sequence: Collards want longer than mustard greens, but sliced into thin ribbons they finish close enough that one pot is right.
- Get the pan hotter than you think: Scallops have about two minutes to build a crust before the inside overcooks. A medium pan cannot do it in that window.
- Add the vinegar to the greens, the lemon to the scallops: Cider vinegar has the depth that suits a long-cooked pot, and lemon has the brightness that suits shellfish. They are not interchangeable here.
- Taste before reaching for the salt cellar: Scallops come out of the water salty on their own, and the smoked paprika and vinegar do a lot of the work you might expect salt to do.
Nutrition & Mindful Eating
- Scallops, two kinds of greens, lentils, and benne seeds are doing four separate jobs in one bowl. The scallops bring the protein and the sweetness, the greens bring bulk and minerals, the lentils give the pot substance, and the seeds land on top for crunch.
- Scallops are sweet, close-grained shellfish that go from translucent to done in about two minutes, and they carry a lot of protein for how delicately they eat, along with the B12 that shellfish are unusually generous with.
- Collard greens and mustard greens together give you two textures and two flavors, silky and peppery, and both are among the better plant sources of calcium. The mustard greens also bring the sharp edge that makes a bowl of greens taste alive.
- Lentils soak up the pot likker and turn a side of greens into a meal. They bring fiber and plant iron, and the cider vinegar and lemon going in around them help your body take up that iron.
- Benne seeds toasted dry in the skillet are the finish, and they are the reason this bowl crunches. For something you measure in spoonfuls they carry a real amount of calcium and iron, and the toasting is what turns them from dusty to nutty.
- As you eat, pay attention to the way the peppery mustard greens play against the sweetness of the scallops, and take the bowl sitting down so you notice when you are comfortably full.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are benne seeds?
It is the old Gulf and Lowcountry name for sesame, brought over by enslaved West Africans and grown along that coast ever since. Heirloom benne has a deeper, more bitter-edged flavor, but ordinary hulled sesame seeds from the grocery store work perfectly here and are what I use most weeks.
My scallops never brown. What am I doing wrong?
Almost always moisture, and sometimes crowding. Pat them dry on both flat sides, then let them sit uncovered on a paper towel for ten minutes while the greens cook. Use a pan wide enough that they are not touching, and get it hotter than feels comfortable before they go in.
Can I use only one kind of green?
You can, and a pound of collards on their own is traditional. You lose the peppery edge the mustard greens bring, so add an extra splash of vinegar and a little more cayenne at the end to make up for it. Turnip greens are the other classic swap.
Can I make this with shrimp?
Yes. Use a pound of large shrimp, seared ninety seconds a side over the same high heat, and pull them the moment they curl into a loose C. Shrimp are more forgiving than scallops, so this is the version to make if you are cooking for a crowd.