Scallop Gratin is an easy baked scallop recipe with a creamy, cheesy, white wine sauce you will LOVE in just 20 minutes!
We love Seafood Recipes on the site and recently we’ve started posting more scallop recipes. You can do so much with fresh scallops, like making Baked Scallops or Pan Seared Scallops, this recipe takes the richness factor up a few notches.
SCALLOP GRATIN
Scallop gratin is so rich and delicious that this may end up being one of your favorite ways to cook seafood. The savory flavor of the cheese and the natural saltiness of the scallops make this recipe the perfect comfort food. The cheesy sauce is so good you may try to eat it straight with a spoon.
If you are making this as a main course, you can serve it up as is, or stick a toothpick in the side of each scallop to make them an easily shareable appetizer for your next fancy get together. Trust me, this is the best use for a broiler ever.
Something to remember when you buy the ingredients for this recipe: you want to use sea scallops and not bay scallops. Bay scallop gratin won’t feed as many people, and unless you want to serve it up as an appetizer you want more meat to go around.
HOW TO MAKE SCALLOP GRATIN
- Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
- Combine cream cheese, wine, lemon and spices in a small bowl until smooth.
- Add scallops to your baking dish, and cover with the sauce, let it sit for five minutes.
- Top with Parmesan and tarragon.
- Bake for 4-5 minutes, then broil for just a minute until golden brown.
Flavor Mix-in Ideas
- Garlic: I love the creamy white wine sauce complementing the scallop’s natural flavors, but you know garlic would give this gratin and amazing flavor. Keep to just 1 clove or it will overwhelm all the flavors..
- Panko Breadcrumbs: just like I did in my recipe for baked scallops, you can add a tiny pile of panko breadcrumbs to the top of each scallop. This dresses them up a bit if you’re serving them as an appetizer for a fancy event, or if you’re just in the mood for a classy dinner.
- Shallots: finely chop shallots and sprinkle them onto the gratin when you put it in the oven. You can also dust the tops with some cayenne or black pepper to mix it up.
- Prosciutto: fold slices of prosciutto onto a plate and set a single scallop on top. Drizzle some sauce over the top and stick a toothpick into it to make a beautiful and delicious hors d’oeuvres. Sprinkle some fresh parsley over it for a dash of color.
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What to Serve with Scallop Gratin:
- Garlic Bread: garlic bread is a classic, delicious side that’s perfect for this scallops au gratin recipe because you can use the thick French bread baked in garlic butter to soak up the sauce.
- Scalloped Potatoes: I didn’t just choose this side because I was being clever with the name. Scalloped potatoes are rich and full of flavor, which makes them a great side to serve with scallop gratin.
- Bacon Parmesan Brussels Sprouts: you won’t have to force your kids to try these Brussels sprouts, they’ll love them almost as much as you will. They’re rich, earthy and full of bacon.
What is a “gratin”?
The term gratin is a mixture of two French words. “Gratter,” which means “to scrape,” and “gratiné” which means “crust” were thrown together to describe the method of cooking a cheesy top layer that gets crispy in the oven.
Over time, le gratin became slang for something high class or high society in France, kind of like the English term “upper crust.”
How to Store Scallop Gratin:
- Serve: you shouldn’t leave scallop gratin out for longer than 2 hours at room temperature.
- Store: your leftovers should last up to 3 days in the fridge before you will want to throw them out.
- Freeze: frozen scallop gratin is good for about 6 months. For the best flavor, you should thaw it out and eat it well before then.
WHEN ARE SCALLOPS SAFE TO EAT?
According to the USDA’s official website you can safely enjoy scallops when the internal temperature reaches 145 degrees F (62.7 degrees C.)
Scallop Gratin
Scallop Gratin is an easy baked scallop recipe with a creamy, cheesy, white wine sauce you will LOVE in just 20 minutes!
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 pounds sea scallops , (u-13 size)
- ¼ cup cream cheese , softened
- ¼ cup white wine
- 1 lemon , juiced and zested
- 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/8 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper
- 1 tablespoon fresh tarragon , chopped
- 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese , shaved
- 1 pinch cayenne pepper , optional (to taste)
Instructions
Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
Add the scallops to your baking dish.
In a large bowl whisk together the cream cheese, white wine, lemon juice, lemon zest, salt, pepper, tarragon, Parmesan cheese and cayenne pepper (if using).
Pour the sauce onto the scallops and let them sit for five minutes before putting into the oven.
Bake for 5 minutes, then turn on the broiler and cook for an additional 1-2 minutes until the tops are golden brown.
I made these to go with Christmas dinner. They look nothing like the picture. The sauce is watery and runny and there is nothing creamy about it. I also had to broil for about 5-7 minutes to have any browning occur (I also had some larger scallops and 5 minutes with 1-2 minutes of broiling would have not been enough to cook through appropriately). While the scallops turned out fine and had good flavor, it was not as described – there was nothing creamy or cheesy about it. It was more like scallops cooked in a white wine sauce.
I’m glad the flavor was still there even though it didn’t look the same. Were the scallops completely thawed and patted down before beginning? I’m wondering if they released liquid which made the sauce more runny than creamy.
So runny! And white. I’m an experienced cook, especially with seafood since we are Heart Healthy. The large sea scallops we get delivered are pricey so this was a huge disappointment!I took a picture to show the white, watery sauce but can’t put it here. I will go back to searing in avocado oil next time. No sauce needed.
Hmm, I might need more information to figure out what happened. Were the scallops you were using completely thawed? Were you cooking from frozen? Did you change any of the other ingredients listed.
Can I use this same application for shrimp? I’m allergic to shrimp, but not scallops & would like to make this using shrimp while I use it for scallops. What adjustments should I make?
If using shrimp, I would bake it at 350 degrees for about 25 minutes.
Delicious way to make Scallops for my first time. My picky Father wanted to eat all the leftover sauce! This was a great recipe… we had a 2 lb bag of Sea Scallops so I upped the ingredients a bit. The Lemon taste and Tarragon are amazing!
I’m so glad you all enjoyed it, Kemilyn.
I thought those dish was super lemon flavored, Next time I would probably do half a lemon otherwise very very good
This recipe is a fail. I followed it exactly and the result was a runny, far from golden result. To even bring the “sauce” close enough to browning resulted in 20+ minutes of overcooking the scallops. I would suggest adding a 1/4 cup more of cream cheese,1/4 cup more of Parmesan, an 1/8 cup of wine, and the juice of 1/2 lemon.
I’m curious at what temperature you cooked this at. Next time, make sure not to overcrowd your pan. Allow space between the scallops for the sauce to cook down and the tops to get brown. Hope this helps for next time.
You must have used that ‘yellow’ cream cheese, or that ‘yellow’ Parmesan……my dish did not look anything like your picture, since all my ingredients were white. It didn’t look thick and creamy either, since there wasn’t any thickening agent in it. I just hate when photos of a dish look so good, and the real thing, not so much. I took a picture to show you, but I see there is no way to attach it. Tasted good, at least, and if that pic didn’t raise my expectations so high, I would probably be a lot more satisfied. Just sayin’…
It’s really annoying that only a certain few of your pictures are able to be pinned. Just saying.
Oh no, it doesn’t let you pin the photos? That is not how it should work! I will test it out and try and resolve it, I’m sorry it is doing that.
Delicious!! Our dinner party loved this!
Yay!! Thanks for the 5 stars Katie.
I love your idea of mixing in prosciutto with the scallops. Delicious!
Thanks!
love love LOVED this recipe!! Was really easy to make and tasted super yummy!
So glad you enjoyed it April.
+1 to it being super runny and i even viewed comments before making. Having to cook scallops way longer to try to thicken the sauce and get golden.
Wow, this looks so cheesy & delicious!! Love that it doesn’t take long to bake. Can’t wait to make it!
Very easy to make. Enjoy!!
At 450° it takes more than five minutes to cook adequately. Two minutes under the broiler didn’t brown anything. The sauce is white, not yellow. Given the price of scallops, No, no, no. Sear your scallops in butter, maybe wrap some bacon around them, you’ll be a lot happier.