Susan Jung’s recipe for scallop, truffle paste and seaweed butter pithiviers
How a delicious pithivier at Hong Kong Japanese restaurant Godenya inspired Susan Jung to create her own version
This is a recipe I thought up one night just as I was falling asleep. I was so excited about it that I got up and wrote it down, worried I would have forgotten it by the morning. It’s inspired by a dish I had tasted Godenya, a small restaurant just off Wellington Street, in Central, which serves Japanese food paired with sake. On one visit, the chef had made a small shirako (male “roe”) and black truffle paste pithivier that was so good I had complained the portion wasn’t big enough.
Shirako is hard to find in Hong Kong – even Japanese supermarkets rarely carry it, so I substituted scallops. What I’m most pleased about is the puff-pastry dough: instead of using plain butter, as they do at Godenya, I made it using beurre d’algues – a seaweed butter that’s available at City’super and Fresh Mart, in Sogo. Puff pastry is not difficult, but it takes several hours to make because it needs to rest in the fridge between turns. Make it at least a day in advance.
Scallop, truffle paste and seaweed butter pithiviers
For the seaweed butter puff pastry:
250 grams beurre d’algues, chilled, divided
250 grams plain (all-purpose) flour, divided, plus extra for rolling the dough
About 120ml iced water
5ml fresh lemon juice
For the filling:
8 fresh scallops, with bodies about 3cm to 3.5cm in diameter, removed from the shell and cleaned
Italian black truffle paste
1 egg, for brushing