SCALLOPS GALICIAN STYLE / VIEIRAS A LA GALLEGA

This is a traditional way to eat scallops in the north-west of Spain. You need:

 - 6 scallops or vieiras, as they are called in Spain .cleaned and with one-side shells- it is always worthwhile leaving them for an hour or so inside a bowl with cold water and a handful of salt as this eliminates any 'sand' within the scallops) If they are small you may want to use two 'vieiras' for each shell.
- 1 onion (diced thinly)
- 120 gr Spanish ham (iberico, serrano or at a push Parma ham) - also diced thinly.
- 100 ml white wine
- juice of a quarter of a lemon
- three tablespoons of fine breadcrumbs
- two table spoons of olive oil and then a drizzle for the final touch
- chopped parsley (1-1.5 teaspoons)
- salt

Preheat the oven at 200 degrees.
Heat the two tablespoons of oil and fry the onion (low heat) until it is soft (around 12 minutes). Then add the diced ham, wait for  3 minutes, increase the heat and add the white wine and lemon. Leave it on for 3-4- minutes until the wine evaporates. There is no need to salt this mixture as it has ham, but add a little bit of salt to the scallops.

Divide the mixture between the six shells of the scallops. Put a scallop on top of each filled shell. Mix the breadcrumbs with the chopped parsley (and a tiny bit more salt) and sprinkle a tablespoon of breadcrumbs on top of each scallop. Drizzle the breadcrumbs with a tiny bit of olive oil. Put the scallops on a tray and put the tray into  over for 15 minutes plus a couple of minutes under the grill so that they come out a bit brown on the edges. Eat immediately.

APPLE ROSE

This is our attempt at the apple roses that became popular a few months ago.
You need:
- a rectangular sheet of puff pastry
- 6 tablespoons of brown sugar
- 50 gr of butter (melted)
- a bowl with water (300 ml) and 3 tablespoons of sugar
- 4 apples.

Preheat the oven at 200 degrees. Slice the apples thinly and put them in the bowl of sugary water  -  microwave it for 5 minutes so that the apples become soft and drain them. Cut the puff pastry into slices ( 5 cms thick) across its shortest side. Place each stripe horizontally. Sprinkle the lower half of each stripe with brown sugar and place the apple slices over the top half overlapping them. Fold the lower side of the stripe over the apples and then roll the stripe from left to right. Butter a muffing tray and place each puff pastry roll into each muffin hole. Push the pastry a bit down with your fingers so that the rose opens up. Paint the apple with the melted  butter and bake for 15 minutes, then lower the temperature to 180 degrees and bake for another 12-15 minutes. Sprinkle with icing sugar.

Most recipes for apple roses use apricot jam, but brown sugar makes a nice caramel base, which works well with the puff pastry. Children enjoy eating this but find the whole process utterly boring, especially as I stupidly did not realise I was competing with France v England on TV - what was I thinking!