The Scallop BLT is one of my signature dishes that you’ve seen me make before, but this time I did a couple of things slightly different- mainly leaving the herbs out of the sauce.

My Dad is scallop crazy, which is why I selected this dish for him. My Mother, however, doesn’t like scallops at all. I know, I know, that makes no sense but there it is. She believes she doesn’t like scallops. Maybe she just says it for the attention? I don’t know.  Whatever the reason, this led me to make her halloumi (imitating scallops) wrapped in bacon for her portion.

Ingredients

Scallops/halloumi
Smoked Bacon Rashers
7 Vine-Ripened Tomatoes
Baby Gem Lettuce Leaves
2-3 Whole peeled Garlic cloves
Salt
Ground black pepper
Olive Oil
Lemon Wedge (for garnish)

Technique

1. Cut scallop sized/shaped pieces from the halloumi.
2. Cut the bacon rashers in half, then wrap them round the scallops/halloumi securing with a cocktail stick.
3. The sauce is crazy simple. In a food processor, chuck in your tomatoes, garlic a pinch of salt and a teaspoon of ground black pepper. Blitz up, gently pour in about 2 teaspoons of olive oil then blitz some more. Done.
4. Separate frying pans! Heat a couple of table spoons of oil on a medium high heat. Your halloumi will need about 4-5 minutes on each side. Normally scallops just need about 2 minutes on each side, but being wrapped in bacon is keeping them moist which means it will take a little longer, so go for 3 minutes on each side!
5. Remove the cocktail sticks and serve on a bed of lettuce, drizzle with your sauce and serve with a lemon wedge for garnish.

Looking for a straight up vegetarian version?

Ingredients

• A big slab of halloumi cheese
• 1 Sweet Ramiro pointed red pepper

1. Pre-heat oven to 190
2. Cut the head off your pepper and get as many seeds out as possible. Place on a baking tray and pop in the oven.
3. After 5 minutes, remove your pepper from the oven, and turn it over the sink- tipping out the juices. Return it to the oven, and repeat this every two minutes three times more, but on the third time remove it from the oven for good. Transfer to chopping board to cool.
4. Now to stuff! Consider the size of your pepper and cut big pieces of halloumi that will fit comfortably. If possible try to keep them quite long.
5. Now stick cocktail sticks evenly through.
   
6. Now slice between the sticks! You will need a fairly sharp knife, to make sure it’s a good even cut rather than a rough tear.
7. Medium heat olive oil in a frying pan. Gently lay all your halloumi pepper slices cheese side down and fry for about 5 minutes on each side.
8. Lay out on a bed of watercress and remove the cocktail sticks. Drizzle with your raw tomato sauce, and just to make sure they match your scallops perfectly add a couple of slices of lemon to the side.
   

And if you didn’t want to completely sacrifice the flavour of bacon, you can fry up a few surprisingly vegetarian bacon bits with the halloumi, or even just sprinkle them on the finished product as they are.

This was the starter I cooked for my Dad’s birthday in 2014. See the Main Course here or skip straight to dessert!