Happy New Year! Elisabeth and I had scallops for dinner, so trying to come up with a side that was gluten-free, delicious and wouldn’t overpower the seafood was harder than I thought. I was hoping to do crispy oven potatoes, but we only had waxy potatoes instead of baking potatoes. But we had a tube of polenta in the cupboard from Fairmont.

I tried frying a slice plain and a slice dipped into cornstarch, egg and cornstarch again and the battered version was a million times better. It was a simple batter — I threw the cornstarch and salt and pepper into a ziplock bag and fried it in a cast iron pan with a bit of oil. Since it was New Years eve, I shallow fried them, but I could have been a bit more conservative with the oil on another night.

I followed Alton Brown’s scallop recipe (though to be fair I could have put them in for 2 minutes a side — only the centre scallops browned up beautifully but they all were perfectly cooked.) Elisabeth prepared broccoli with a bit of lemon peel she stole from the preserved lemon jar she started yesterday and it was wonderful.