Baked Scallops in sparkling wine and butter, with potatoes

Scallops:
2 tbsp butter
1 small shallot, finely chopped (I omitted this ingredient - my bf hates any kind of onions)
1 garlic clove, minced
1/4 cup sparkling wine (or if you're trashy and broke like me, use the champagne of ginger ales - Canada Dry!)
1/4 tsp paprika
cayenne, to taste
10-12 large scallops, patted dry
salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
2 tsp freshly chopped parsley

Potatoes:
3-4 red potatoes, sliced into rings
A bit of salt, pepper, and garlic powder
A bit of butter
A bit of shredded cheese

Normally, this kind of potato is made on the BBQ, but I live in an apartment with no balcony, so I had to use the next best thing:
It actually worked really well.



















Chop up your potatoes and throw them in the microwave for 3-4 minutes, just to speed up the process. Most of the cooking should happen on the Foreman, but potatoes take a long-ass time to cook, and we're improvising and experimenting here, right?











Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Melt the butter in a small pot over medium heat. Add the shallot and garlic and cook 2 minutes. Mix in wine, paprika and cayenne and bring to a simmer, then remove from heat.











Put the scallops in a small baking dish, or if you're really adventurous, use large scallop shells.













Spoon or pour the butter mixture over the scallops.














Season with salt and pepper. As you can see, I like freshly ground pepper. As you can also see, I was in a real picture-taking mood this day. This goes in the oven for 10 minutes, or until the scallops are just cooked through.











Those potatoes are out of the microwave, so thrown them in some tinfoil (it has to be enough to go all the way around and make a little envelope) and put a bit of butter in there so they don't stick to each other, the foil, etc. Add your salt, pepper and garlic powder.
Hey, what's that in the background? Sparkling wine? Champagne? Canada Dry?
Fold the tinfoil over and put this on the Foreman for about 7 minutes.








When they come out, add a bit of shredded cheese and close the tinfoil again, so it melts. These are really like barbecued potatoes - they even have the crispy browned bits around the edges...
Just about now, your scallops should be done cooking....











There they are. Top them off with parsley and serve.














Yeah, show me the good stuff, baby.

New Orleans Barbecued Shrimp

Another Allrecipes experiment... I have no idea why this is called "New Orleans" or "barbecued" but it's good anyway.

1 pound shrimp, heads off and peeled
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup zesty Italian dressing
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2 teaspoons ground black pepper
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
A loaf of French bread or garlic bread







Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Wash shrimp and drain well.
Melt butter in a one quart casserole dish, or use a saucepan, which I prefer.













Add salad dressing, lemon juice, black pepper and garlic powder.













Add shrimp to the casserole dish. Stir gently to cover the shrimp with the mixture. Or pour the mix over the shrimp, then you don't have to do any stirring! Cover and bake, stirring occasionally for 25 to 30 minutes or until shrimp are pink.











Serve the shrimp hot on a large platter and place the sauce in individual bowls so that you can easily 'dunk' bread in the sauce!

Those Peanut Butter Marshmallowy things everyone remembers from being a kid...

That's right, a real live recipe for those peanut butter marshmallow squares. You won't believe how easy these are, which is probably why everyone used to bring them to barbecues and picnics and potlucks.

2/3 cup butter (real butter works best here people)
1 cup-ish peanut butter (I prefer smooth)
1 pkg butterscotch chips
1 pkg little colored marshmallows

Put your marshmallows in a baking tray first. There's some timing issues here. also like to use those disposable trays because then can take them to someone's house and they just get left there or thrown out when they're done.

Melt the butter in a medium-sized pot. I don't really measure out a cup of peanut butter: a big scoop usually works just fine. Melt and stir these together until smooth.












When those are all melted together, throw in the package of butterscotch chips. You have to keep these well-stirred - the little suckers tend to clump up and want to burn.

ps, like my action shot here?










When everything's melted all together, pour the mixture over your marshmallows.














Mix it all around. You'll probably want to put this in the freezer for about 1/2 hour (I always make this RIGHT BEFORE I have to be somewhere...) or the fridge for a bit would probably work too. Yum.

Apple Pie

• recipe for a pie crust, store bought pie crust, depends how much time you have.
• 1/2 cup butter
• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• cinnamon and nutmeg to taste
• Enough Granny Smith apples to fill a pie crust - I used about 4, but they were pretty big.

• 
  I was too lazy to make my own pie crust, even though I know they're easy. I used this:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Melt the butter in a saucepan. Stir in flour to form a paste.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Add water, white sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg, and bring to a boil. I used about 1 tsp of nutmeg and maybe 1 tbsp of cinnamon... I didn't measure. Reduce temperature and let simmer.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Place the bottom crust in your pan. Fill with apples, mounded slightly. Cover with a lattice work of crust. I clearly suck at taking pictures, but my sister and friend are coming over today to make one of these with crabapples, so will try to do a little better...
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Put this thing on a cookie tray or something! There is some runoff once it starts to bake and heat up and you don't want that in your oven.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Gently pour the sugar and butter liquid over the crust. Pour slowly so that it does not run off.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Bake 15 minutes in the preheated oven. Reduce the temperature to 350 degrees. Continue baking for 35 to 45 minutes, until apples are soft. 

This will make you a hit with the new in-laws, trust me.