Let’s see… It’s Cinco de Mayo and the Kentucky Derby. The dinner possibilities are pretty much endless… So endless, in fact, that I decided to ignore all of it and cook up some scallops.

I suppose I could have come up with some sort of blending of the two cultures, but while I really love Mexican food, Kentucky food is nothing special. I’m not making Burgoo and Mint Juleps are a waste of good whisky. Or bad whisky. They are just not my cup of tea, so to speak. I have even had them at the Brown Hotel in Louisville. In real silver julep cups. Meh.

Besides… I’m pretty much boycotting anything Kentucky as long as Mitch McConnell is in office. He’s a creep.

Which brought me back to Mexico – and Nonna. She won’t eat anything with any spice to it and I wasn’t in the mood to cook two dinners, so… a simple scallop dish was born. I had picked up the scallops at Reading Terminal Market when I was last down there and I’m working on trying to get the freezer emptied a bit. I acn pack that little bugger out pretty good – but at some point, the goodies need to be rotated out. I can’t even imagine what it would be like if we had another freezer downstairs…

Scallops thawed, I went to work…

I heated a skillet with a bit of olive oil and butter and added the scallops I had patted dry. A couple of minutes on each side was enough to brown them and cook them through.

I took them out of the skillet and added a bit of minced shallot, and then a splash of white wine, lemon zest, a squeeze of lemon juice, and some parsley. And a pinch of salt and pepper.

Plated them and spooned the sauce over the top.

Really simple, really basic – and really good. And one step closer to an empty freezer.