“There, these are not real Saint-Jacques, loose Gaëtan Loiseau.
These are scallops.
We look at him, taken aback.
The product of the Picard brand that he holds in his hands, however, clearly indicates that we are dealing with “scallops”!
"The Latin name for the species in this package is' argopecten purpuratus," the shell fisherman continues, wearing his wetsuit, pointing to the fine print.
We fish for scallops, but the real ones: pecten maximus.
"
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Here is a summary of all the ambiguity that hovers around the name of the mollusk.
"The name" Saint-Jacques "is more rewarding than the name" scallop ", explains Dominique Lamort, quality manager at the Normandy freshness sea association. So, in order to sell in France, large scallop-producing countries have asked the World Trade Organization the right to use that name - and they got it.
France had to align.
"
Speak latin well
At the moment, in Picard stores, one can thus find under the same name an immense variety of species: argopecten purpuratus, zygochlamys patagonica… One can even find a very curious “scallop shell”: “these are scallops, zygochlamys or argopecten, which are cooked in a scallop shell, ”comments Dominique Lamort.
The most effective way to know what you are really buying, you will understand, is not obvious: you have to refer to the Latin name of the species.
Its mention is compulsory on the packaging and labels of fishmongers' stalls.
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In order to find out if there were other clues so as not to be mistaken, we embarked with Gaëtan Loiseau on the Welga boat (*) for a fishing for precious bivalves off Saint-Malo.
After 8 minutes of diving at 15m depth, he goes back to the deck with a full bag.
“You can recognize a scallop by its 14 striations,” he explains, pointing to the reliefs on the surface of one of the shells.
The one drawn on the Picard package has a lot more!
"
A matter of weight
On the other hand, we cannot trust the presence or the appearance of the coral, this generally orange appendage, which depends on seasonality. You can't trust the size of the nut either: some scallops are small and some scallops can be very large. We can also rely on it even less as some wholesalers market "preparations based on Saint-Jacques".
On the bucket that we got from Rungis, everything is very explicit: the Saint-Jacques constitutes 70% of the weight of the contents. “After preparation,” says the label, the weight of the scallops has risen to 89%. Gain: 19%. How did the manufacturer do it? It's very simple: he placed the nuts in a bath of water and salt. The Saint-Jacques are then naturally gorged with liquid. “If I sell this to my clients, it will be good. I will have won 19% of the price. I am going to charge for water at the price of Saint-Jacques and the consumer will go to the cash register ”, protests Simon Flament, fishmonger at the head of the“ Montreuil-sur-Mer ”shop in Montreuil (93 ).
It becomes really scandalous when we discover that, in its 2017 report, the DGCCRF checked 22 Saint-Jacques and that 8 of them had abnormally high humidity levels.
Some of the samples were taken from supermarkets and a fish shop.
We tasted
Between scallops and its cousins, scallops, is there such a big difference in taste?
Three Picard products were blind tested with Sibylle Sellam, the chef of the Bercail restaurant in Rennes.
"This one is full of sand, it's hell," she grimaces, blindfolded, after eating the only real scallop placed in front of her.
“These have a little less taste but the texture is nicer,” she remarks after tasting zygochlamys patagonica scallops.
And the last ones, argopecten purpuratus?
“The nut is not very interesting.
"
In the ranking, the two scallops come first, zygochlamys (33.16 € / kg) first, argopecten (28.75 € / kg) next.
The scallop pecten maximus (69.83 € / kg) is last, penalized it is true by its grains of sand.
In summary, two tips to be sure to eat scallop: one, if it is sold in its shell, check that it has 14 streaks;
two, if sold in nuts, as is most often the case, check the name of the species, pecten maximus.
It only remains to hope that she does not squeal in her teeth ...
(*) Their Saint-Jacques are sold by the Poiscailles site, which put us in touch with the crew.