Great Foods We Have Lost

Scallops in their Shell

Sorry Rick - Verboten!

One of the most amazing sights we have ever seen was the privilege of watching Paul O'Connell cleaning and presenting a huge mound of fresh scallops early one morning in Cork's English market. A combination of dazzling speed and incredible dexterity, he tore into a mountain of scallops and, within minutes, had them cleaned and arranged all set for sale.

But, that was in the old days, when you were still permitted to buy these piscine beauties fresh in the shell.

'If they're in the shell they're alive!' exclaims Pat O'Connell of O'Connell's fish merchants, expressing his disgust at the policy of preventing fishmongers from selling scallops in their shells. 'And I've never ever got a satisfactory answer as to why we are not allowed sell them that way'.

'It used to be lovely to see 'em snapping away. They'd be clipping away inside their shells. Now they come in tubs from designated factories.

'That brings on other problems too. You can always wheel and deal with the fishermen, but when the big boys get involved they get tempted to fix the price.

'Also it's another layer of bureaucracy, which, I wonder, was it ever needed? It all suits the big fellas, not the small family firms. And that's the way 'tis going nowadays.'