[Sca-cooks] scalloped potatoes and corn

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

On Dec 14, 2005, at 8:16 PM, Stefan li Rous wrote:

> Cailte mentioned a pot luck dinner:
>>  everything from deep fried turkey to scalloped corn w/
>> green chili to plum pudding, biscochitos and mincemeat
>> pie.
>
> Hmm. Adamantius? Anyone else? Know where the term "scalloped" came  
> from in scalloped potatoes and scalloped corn etc.?
>
> I can't ever remember having such a dish that had real scallops in it.

I know I've read about this, but don't recall where, and my brain is  
slightly more than usually fried tonight, but briefly, I believe it  
works like this:

Foods are sometimes cut into little (often round) slices (including,  
but not limited to, the adductor muscles of scallops). These little  
slices are known, at various times in the history of culinary terms,  
as escallops in French and scallops or collops in English. One common  
dish cut in this way, probably from the 19th century, is scalloped or  
escalloped potatoes, typically baked in milk or cream or a milk-or- 
cream-based sauce, sometimes gratineed under a topping of grated cheese.

By extension, other dishes made in this manner (such as scalloped  
corn) are "scalloped" without the little round slices.

Adamantius




"S'ils n'ont pas de pain, vous fait-on dire, qu'ils  mangent de la  
brioche!" / "If there's no bread to be had, one has to say, let them  
eat cake!"
     -- attributed to an unnamed noblewoman by Jean-Jacques Rousseau,  
"Confessions", 1782

"Why don't they get new jobs if they're unhappy -- or go on Prozac?"
     -- Susan Sheybani, assistant to Bush campaign spokesman Terry  
Holt, 07/29/04