Why do we eat only the adductor muscle of the scallop, and not the whole animal?
In: Biology
A) Because that’s the part that tastes good
B) Because the remainder is mostly organs, which can contain some toxic stuff in filter feeders like scallops
That being said, there are cultures that put the whole animal in soups.
We have the West Coast swimming scallop, these two wild species of scallops, Pink and Spiny scallops, are found off of Vancouver Island. They are also commonly known as ‘Swimming’, ‘Pink’, or ‘Singing’ scallops. They are smaller than the other species of scallops commonly eaten.
I eat them whole but the visual means restaurants mostly trim the dangly bits.
I was just in Japan and they serve grilled scallops whole.
Parts of it are clam like (maybe overcooked clam like, not as tender) but a big chunk of it was dark colored mush, which was edible but not great.
Edit: At time 3:40 you can see how they clean the scallop then put all the edible bits back on the shell for grilling:
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