Shrimp and Scallop Pasta with Orange Cream Sauce will soon become your favorite seafood pasta recipe. Beautiful tender seafood drenched in a creamy orange sauce and served over delicate fettuccini noodles. A lovely seafood recipe for date night or entertaining.
And if you’re looking for more main course pasta dinner recipes, take a look at my recipe for Creamy Chicken Fajita Pasta.
How To Find a Good Shrimp and Scallops Pasta Recipe
A search on the internet will produce a zillion recipes, but sorting through them to find and determine a really great recipe can be a task.
My favorite way to find new recipes is through conversation. Simply asking friends and acquaintances “What’s your favorite thing to cook”? I love hearing the passionate descriptions and the history that comes along with the recipes. Try it some time, you’ll enjoy watching their eyes light up and how they describe the flavors. Fun!
Every once in a while you’ll get a reply of “I don’t like to cook”. Bingo! Even better yet. Prying these people can produce some real gems.
Perfect example: This wonderful Pineapple Cake Recipe, a family recipe straight from Missouri. A simple find from relatives visiting friends of mine. And it happened to be her favorite recipe.
Some of my greatest finds come from being invited into someone’s home for dinner. Such was the case last weekend when we were invited over to friends Greg and Cauleen’s.
On the table was shrimp scallops and pasta served with an orange cream sauce. I mean really … get OUT!
The shrimp and scallops were lightly floured, then seared and mixed with this decadent creamy orange sauce. Spoiler alert, Vermouth is the secret ingredient to make this sauce extra special.
Served over fettuccine noodles, this restaurant quality meal was a dinner party treat.
How To Make Shrimp and Scallops with Pasta
This isn’t a difficult recipe to make, however, it’s also not one of those bing – bam – on the table in a jiff meals.
- First, supreme the oranges. Which means slicing off the skin and pith so those oranges will show beautifully when sprinkled over the finished pasta. It’s easy. Just cut off the top and the bottom of the orange. Then stand the orange upright and with a sharp chef knife, start at the top of the orange and slice the skin off, including the white membrane. Voila, perfect beautiful slices of citrus. Then lift out the orange wedges. Hey look, you’re a restaurant chef! 🙂 You can check out a photo “how-to supreme an orange” in this post for Grilled Shrimp Salad.
- Next make the orange cream sauce. You can keep it warm on the stovetop while finishing the meal.
- Step 3 is cooking the pasta.
- While the pasta is cooking, heat a good heavy skillet over medium high heat. Add a bit of butter and olive oil. Place the scallops, standing up in the skillet and cook until browned on one side, about 2 minutes. Turn the scallops and then add the shrimp. Cook until shrimp are browned and the scallops are cooked through. About three more minutes.
- Drain the pasta and return to the pan. Toss the orange cream sauce into the pasta and mix well.
- Place the pasta in your favorite pasta serving bowls, add the shrimp and scallops on top and then sprinkle on those beautiful orange slices. You’ve got a beautiful shrimp scallops and pasta meal that will WOW your crowd.
Pro Tip: Always choose good quality scallops. Some store bought scallops are soaked in a phosphate solution which plumps them up with water with also increases the price. It’s important to look for scallops that are labeled “dry” or “dry packed”. A phosphate soaked scallop can taste soapy. A dry packed scallop will sear quicker and and beautifully.
Recipe for Shrimp and Scallops Pasta with Orange Cream Sauce
I hope you give this recipe for shrimp scallop pasta a try, and if you do, please come back and give the recipe a star rating. And leave a comment about your experience with the recipe.
And if you have a favorite recipe for shrimp and scallops with pasta, or a favorite seafood pasta recipe, let me know, I’d love to give it a try.
More Creamy Pasta Recipes
- Pasta with Lemon Cream Sauce
- Pasta with Slow Roasted Cherry Tomatoes and Cream
- Instant Pot Chicken Chipotle Mac and Cheese
- Spicy Creamy Shrimp Pasta
And the most popular recipe in my Pasta Recipes Category, Flemings Steakhouse Mac and Cheese. Add some steamed lobster meat to this one for an elegant seafood pasta dinner.
If you liked this recipe, please leave a star ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ rating in the recipe card below and leave a comment. I always appreciate your feedback and hearing how everything went.
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Shrimp Scallop Pasta With Orange Cream Sauce
Ingredients
- fresh lemon juice
- 12 jumbo shrimp peeled and deveined
- 12 sea scallops
- all-purpose flour to dust the seafood
- 4 tablespoons butter divided
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 small shallots fine chopped
- 2 cloves garlic chopped
- ¼ cup dry vermouth
- ⅔ cup orange juice
- 1 cup heavy cream
- ½ teaspoon basil dried, or 4 fresh leaves chopped
- 1 orange supreme cleaned and separated into wedges
- 1 pound Fettuccini cooked according to package instructions
Instructions
- Supreme the orange. Remove skin and pith and divide into wedges, set aside.
- Squeeze a little lemon juice on shrimp and scallops; toss them lightly in flour. Set aside.
- In a sauce pan melt 2 tablespoons of the butter. Add shallots and cook until tender. Add garlic and cook until fragrant. Pour vermouth over shallots and garlic and reduce by ½. Add orange juice and cook until reduced by ⅓. Add the heavy cream and simmer for about 10 minutes. Set aside and keep warm
- In the meantime, cook the fettuccini noodles according to package directions.
- When the pasta is well underway cooking, heat a large skillet over medium high heat. Add the remaining 2 tablespoons butter and the olive oil. When the oils are hot, add the scallops, standing up. Brown the scallops, this will take 2 – 3 minutes and then with tongs, turn them over. Then add the shrimp. Cook until the shrimp are golden brown and the scallops are cooked through. About another 2 – 3 minutes.
- Drain the pasta and return to pan. Pour the orange cream sauce over the pasta and with tongs, turn to mix well.
- To serve, place the pasta into your favorite pasta bowls and top with the scallops and shrimp dividing them evenly between the bowls. Sprinkle on the orange slices and chopped basil.
Notes
Nutrition
Shrimp Scallop Pasta With Orange Cream Sauce. ..It’s whats for dinner.
Why Trust These Recipes? Lea Ann Brown has lived, worked and played in Colorado for 45 years. She has immersed herself in the Colorado Culinary space, is a Culinary School Graduate and publishes her Colorado food Blog, Cooking On The Ranch.
Oops! Between the cream cheese and sweet onion add your layer of thinly sliced fish (about 1/16″ vertical slice). I’ve smoked with all the fruit and nut woods and find pecan to be my favorite for fish and please visit us: https://www.beckandbulow.com
This recipes looks amazing! Thanks for sharing.
I love this recipe / menu for so many reasons! It’s the perfect amount of food for two, the ingredient list is simple and the timing is laid out very nicely! I will definitely try this at home. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks Vickie. I’m waiting to hear from Cauleen to see if I left anything out. 🙂
I’m not sure where she got the recipe, we loved it.
Lea Ann