Special occasion food should be all about what you love most, shared with the people you love most. And sometimes it’s also about spending time with those loved ones enjoying the occasion and not spending too long in the kitchen preparing the food and being away from your guests. Don’t misunderstand me, I love spending hours and even days preparing a special meal, but this is one for when you don’t want to be in the kitchen for too long.
Ingredients (per person)
- 1 small Dover Sole (or other small flat fish)
- 4 large prawns (peeled and the heads removed but the tails left on to make eating them with your fingers much easier!)
- 2 scallops
- About 2 tablespoons of fresh samphire (or use a few stalks of fresh, blanched asparagus chopped into smaller pieces)
- Olive oil
- Butter
- Lemon juice
- Salt & Pepper
Warm a little olive oil and butter in a large frying pan and heat. When the oil is hot, put the fish in, skin side down and cook for about 2 or 3 minutes until the skin starts to become crispy.
Turn the heat down to medium and turn the fish over. Add the scallops and prawns and cook them on each side for about a minute or two (the prawns will turn pink and the scallops will lose their opacity).
Remove the fish, prawns and scallops to a serving plate (keeping the oil in the pan). Squeeze in a little lemon juice to taste and add the samphire. Stir fry on a high heat for less than a minute, just to heat it through and spoon the samphire and juices over the fish. Season to taste (it probably won’t need much salt) and serve with a small wedge of lemon.
Pour glasses of wine for you and your loved ones and enjoy the moment.
Chica Andaluza 
I really want that!
Come on over….ooops, I think you’re a bit busy right now!
Yum, I love flat fish (what we call flounder, here)
I usually go for a big size but adding the scallops and prawns really appeals.
We have all different kinds of sole – these are usually bigger here but for some reason that were they were small!
I haven’t enjoyed a sole for the longest time! This is a winner of a meal Tanya.
I will have to buy sole on my next trip to town.
Have a beautiful week ahead and hope you are back on track with getting my post notifications.
🙂 Mandy xo
Glad oyu liked it Mandy and I am keeping my fingers crossed that I have resubscribed properly and it will work now!
That looks delicious, you’ve reminded me of Julia Childs and sole meunière 😉
Wasn’t that her “Road to Damascus” dish?!
According to the film Julia and Julia I suspect yes. Meryl Streep certainly conveyed that impression. I found a nice old video of Julia discussing fish and in particular sole 🙂
She was a character! I didn’t much like Julie and Julia and I read that Mrs Childs didn’t think much of the project either! Julia (I like to think we would have been on first name terms) really made “proper2 cooking like this accessible to people who previously had been bought up on a very different diet.
Perfect meal! I was not so enamoured with the samphire we had in Wales 🙂
What a shame about the Samphire you had – maybe it wasn’t fresh or cooked properly, or maybe it’s just not for you L
Love samphire – we are so lucky to live on the coast
We are, we are!
Such a bright looking dish! Wonderful.
It was a pretty dish to serve up!
I didn’t hear of samphire before…….But I’ll use asparagus , as you suggest….
This dish must be fabulous ,thanks Tanya!
I think another name for it is sea asparagus!
Thank you again!
Guess I’ll have to settle for asparagus… I always learn something new here! Mmmmm… hungry NOW!
If you can get the really thin spears (which I think pack more flavour sometimes and you get more tips!) it would be lovely J
To me this is what eating fish and seafood is all about…a fresh and simple preparation of good ingredients that make an easy and elegant…and very tasty, dish. I’d never heard of samphire, probably because I’ve never lived in a coastal area. It’s so pretty! I want to reach into the photo with a fork and taste this dish. 🙂
I agree Betsy – beautifully fresh fish has its own special and distinct flavour and mostly doesn’t need to much else to enhance it!
My motto…”never say never”…with recipes like this…
http://www.forkandbeans.com/2014/05/06/king-oyster-mushroom-scallops/
http://www.sheknows.com/food-and-recipes/articles/1020009/vegan-scallops-over-pasta-with-creamy-white-wine-sauce-recipe
The narf SHALL go to the “scallop” ball! They even have recipes for vegan bacon and faux fishy-fish and the samphire is ALL mine 🙂
Not sure if you got my first response but it was something along the lines of “where there’s a will there’s a way”. Could only connect to the first link for the scallops – but “wow” what a great idea and how very clever! I love mushrooms anyway and a huge grilled mushroom often packs more flavour and texture than a steak, so using them to “make” scallops is genius! Am going to try that second link again later and see if if works.
Didn’t get your first response but this one is AOK 🙂 Glad you liked that scallop linky. There is nothing like an ex-meat eating vegan to be inventive and very creative when it comes to tasty subs ;). Haven’t tried them yet as Far Flung Tassie only gets those giant Oyster Mushies for a very short time (if at all) but I can live in hope 😉
I’ve never seen the giant oyster mushrooms either, but maybe just normal ones would work using the whole thing. It wouldn’t look like a scallop but who cares!
I think that “some” vegans want to replicate shapes and textures and pretend that they are actually eating a scallop equivalent. Me, not so much. I am more happy to eat tasty food that is good for me than need it to be the same shape ;). I must admit, if I used all vegan ingredients (coconut bacon, mushroom “scallops”…) I might need the rest of the bottle of wine to convince me that I was eating something vaguely in the same ball-park as your recipe 😉
We are thoroughly enjoying asparagus at the moment but if we were coastal I am sure samphire would work too. I am really looking forward to trying samphire VERY fresh,
I only recently (last year) got to enjoy samphire for the first time and it really has a lovely fresh, salty, seaside flavour! Mind you, I love asparagus too J
Beautiful ingredients – I’m such a big fan of samphire, but it isn’t used widely enough. More people need to realise how delicious it is.
The fishmonger was giving little tastings to customers the other day as I think so many people have never had a chance to try it.
So right about this being a special occasion dish…everyone would love it.
Thanks Karen – it was a big hit!
What a lovely, classic way of preparing beautiful ingredients Tanya. I keep hearing about samphire, but have yet to try it… living inland probably doesn’t help! Will have to keep an eye out at the markets all the same.
Do hope you come across it one day – it’s a very unique flavour!
I do like a scallp. Also loved the Sweet Potato Gratin recipe in your previous post. I had spotted the Ottolenghi version when you “forced” me to buy the books previously! Saw this http://home.bt.com/lifestyle/6-ways-to-eat-strawberries-11363913526186 whilst you don’t often do sweet recipes, you are in England during strawberry season this year and I did think that at least a couple of the recipes sounded like ones you would try. L x
Hi Lynn – glad you liked the recipes and yes…you’re so right…time for some strawberry recipes! Thanks for the link – some great ideas J
You KNOW I love easy-peasy! 🙂
Me too!
Gorgeous! It’s not easy to find samphire here, but that would be far better than asparagus if I could have it! A lovely, lovely dish. 😀
xoxo,
Kathryn
Glad you liked it Kathryn – I think I’m really lucky to be able to get hold of samphire quite easily in England J
Divine! Simple, fishy and lemony. Just what I like 🙂
You know, I believe this is the second recipe tonight that has samphire in it and it is absolutely the first time in my life I’ve heard of this! How exciting to discover a new ingredient and this looks like the best easy recipe to try it with!
It’s funny sometimes it happens this way – something you’ve never heard of keeps popping up! If you ever come across it, do give it a try J
Been browsing through your blog today and yum – this is definitely one of my favourites so far. I ‘m not much of a cook, so I doubt I could pull it off, but I’d love to taste it, that’s for sure ;).
Glad you liked it and thanks for stopping by!
I love eating shrimp with my fingers too… Don’t get a fright… I am going to unfollow and refollow you .. so your pages get to my email! c
Funny things are happening on wordpress, I am missing lots of posts I thought I had followed!
Didn’t know Samphire, something new to try next time I have the chance to visit the UK!
It’s quite a fresh and special flavour – do hope you get to try it one day!
Mmmmh, it looks very yummy indeed! 🙂 We love Samphire, it so salty-summery-crunchy and the best match for fish, butter at this time of the year.
Greetings from Cley next the Sea
Dina
Hi Dina, thanks for visiting and your lovely comment! So glad you know and enjoy samphire – such a shame that so few people can try it 😦
Guess I’ll have to settle for asparagus… I always learn something new here! Mmmmm… hungry NOW!
Lovely dish.. I like to eat scallops and prawns… It looks yummy
I will cook this recipe for my special ones. Thanks for this recipe
it looks fresh and yummy. I want to try this recipe. thanks for your article about this recipe