A Beautiful Trio of Fresh Ingredients to Give This Scallop Dish a Pop

Dive Into This Roasted Scallop Dish

Written By: Rebecca Klinesmith
Photographed By: Nathan Whelan Chianina Steakhouse

Since its opening three years ago, the culinary team at Chianina Steakhouse, located on Naples Island in Long Beach, has proven that this is not your father’s steakhouse.  It is the only restaurant in the entire United States to breed, raise, and serve Chianina beef – an Italian breed of cattle known for their enormous size and lean beef.

Once the animal arrives to its Long Beach commissary, Working Class Kitchen, the Italian steakhouse uses a nose-to-tail approach making use of every part of the animal.  This fresh approach spills into its side dishes as well as it relies on local farms, such as Farm Lot 59, to procure the freshest ingredients.  The result is a carefully crafted menu with seasonal offerings.

Chianina blends traditional with contemporary preparing its Chianina beef as they do in Italy – over an open flame, served very rare, and finished with olive oil.  Chef Bryant Taylor collaborates with his team to ensure each meal is memorable for his guests.  The 22-seat bar, which offers happy hour from 5-7pm Tuesday through Sunday with select nights repeating the ritual from 9pm until closing, takes the same approach. The menu of handcrafted cocktails embraces each season with sprigs of lavender or cucumber disks adding flavor, texture and colorful garnishes.  Sommelier and Managing Partner Massimo Aronne has created a curated wine list of mostly Italian vintages with a mix of California wines.  

Behind the doors of this landmark restaurant is an intimate and inviting ambiance with a subtle mix of swank.  The open and airy space features roomy banquets coupled with dark woods and ambient lighting punctuated with soothing earth tones.  The 22-seat bar runs the entire length of the building and is often buzzing with the sound of corks being popped and chatty conversation.  The restaurant is perfectly situated for an Italian steakhouse with picturesque canals and Venetian gondolas ferrying passengers just steps away.  

Roasted Scallop Ingredients:
Scallops
Blood Orange
Sunchokes
Nasturtium

Chef Bryant Taylor, a graduate of Cordon Bleu in Pasadena, has been behind the kitchen door of restaurants since he was a high school student. He originally collaborated at Michael’s on Naples, Chianina’s sister restaurant, before moving a few doors down to Chianina.

We got the chance to sit down with him and discuss how he creates his tasty Roasted Scallop dish, which was added to the prixe-fixe dinner menu on New Year’s Eve. From four simple ingredients—scallops, blood orange, sunchokes and nasturtium—we learned comes a delicious and unique dish. The sunchokes taste mildly sweet and provide a nice texture—it goes together effortlessly with the scallops which were seared to perfection—they were soft and chewy, and tasted incredibly fresh. The blood orange was quite delicious and surprisingly tastes much like a regular orange, and added a refreshing twist to the dish. The nasturtium flower delivers a peppery taste, and adds a unique look to the dish—it is grinded in a blender and sprinkled on top as a garnish.

 

Q&A With Executive Chef Bryant Taylor of Chianina Steakhouse

Q: Can you give us the process of creating this dish from scratch?

Bryant Taylor: At the base is the sunchoke puree. We just thinly slice those, and we cook it down to where it’s very soft and then puree and then strain it. Then we have blood orange gel, that’s just blood orange juice that we gel using a little bit of agar. Sunchokes are then grated and fried, and then the nasturtium, which we use the fresh leaves as a garnish. We then dehydrate them in a hydrator and blend them in a spice grinder for the powder.

Q: How do you make it work with the flavors?

BT: Just knowing the sunchoke and blood orange work well together. It’s also something that we’re getting in right now coming into season. I love the flavor combination of nasturtium, the sunchoke, and the blood orange. Knowing those work well together and then presenting them in a couple of different ways makes it a little more interesting.

Q: How is the dish doing with customers thus far?

BT: It’s actually new to the menu, but we’ve had good feedback so far on it. It was something we played with on New Year’s Eve on our prixe-fixe menu.

Don’t Forget Dessert! Chianina offers delectable dessert options like the chocolate parfait, toffee cake, banana pudding, vanilla panna cotta, and the artisan California cheese platter.

Wine About It: With small-batch, boutique wines from around the world, you’re sure to find a wine that complements any of your dishes from scallops to steak.

Chianina Steakhouse
5716 E 2nd St
Long Beach, CA 90803
562.434.2333
Try the Roasted Scallop at Chianina Steakhouse

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