My pups have crossed the Rainbow Bridge. I wish I had a video to post of them pushing a nearly empty tin of tuna across our kitchen floor and into the living room where their beds were. Funny.
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Interesting you say that. Long ago, the word on the street was that sea scallops were actually cut out from skate wings.
I use to buy USA scallops at Kroger. $12.99 per pound. But I got over that. Now you’re making me wonder if they were really scallops at $13 per pound. The best scallops come from Stonington, CT. Last time up there they were $16 per pound and well worth it. No telling what they cost now.
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I’ve got no trouble finding and buying real scallops; I only have difficulty finding the dry pack kind, though probably easily available in Seattle. The frozen, large bags from Costco have been very nice quality and price. That said, I’ve had faux or bad scallops in restos, in both inter- mountain west, and Whistler, BC, but only those two times.
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Skate is no doubt much cheaper than shark fin. Or scallops 
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I always heard if they had a beard attached where it connected to the shell it was real.
Shark fin costs hundreds of dollars per pound. Scallops at my local greenmarket cost $22/lb. Selling scallops made from shark fin seems like a great way to lose money, and maybe go to jail, since “finning” is illegal in a lot of places. Scallops cut from other parts of the shark (and skate, as @Miss_belle notes) is much more likely.
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Mine aren’t in the shell, when I buy, but they do have that little tough piece, where once attached, @jcostiones.
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I’ve never seen them in the shell on the Texas coast, thanks for confirming the tough piece.
It’s possible my memory fails me, or that time has marched on and shark fin is now too expensive. Google found this https://doctordavidfriedman.com/blog/scallops-the-most-counterfeit-food ; I don’t know the credibility of the source. It was the first return from Google for whatever that is worth.
My wife loves scallops. I buy them frozen from Sam’s Club and she seems pleased. They don’t do anything for me so I’d rather she eat them and enjoy them.
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Hmm, I’ve seen scallops still in the shell and I’ve never seen beards on them. Maybe they get cleaned off by the fishmonger before they’re put on display. They definitely should have that bright orange sac like thing that is like a giant clam belly.
I’ve had skate and while I see some similarities with the meat and texture that I undertand why some might “cheat” with skate, most skate I’ve seen are way thinner than a proper sea scallop. Unless folks are buying the small bay scallops (but then there’s a huge difference in taste, IMO) I don’t see how a circle of skate would work. Skate wings also have all those little bones that run through it, which can’t be pulled out like a pin bone. I wonder if this is more rumor than truth that fake scallops are skate, or someone will need to do one of those fascinating “how xx gets made” shows to elucidate this for me.
No, they don’t. Just a big piece of cartilage. You may be thinking of a different fish.
https://www.brownetrading.com/how-to/filleting-skate-wings/
But I agree that a cylinder of skate wing won’t look much like a scallop - the “grain” runs the wrong way, for starters.
Definitely skate, but I’m probably not describing accurately. I’m thinking “bones” but you’re probably right that they are cartilage instead. They are fairly thin in structure, and almost tubular, but yes they lay horizontal vs vertical so the meat on them go in the wrong direction for scallops. Either way though, most of the skate I’ve had don’t seem thick enough to “punch” out scallops (if that’s what the claim is) unless they’re talking about some really big skates!
I’ve been reading this with curiosity; the Pacific skate is the largest of all skates, and they’re big. Sometimes called rays out West. According to Wiki, it is sometimes marketed as scallops, or fake scallops. Typically found in Waters from the Aleutian Islands, down to central Baja. Hope this helps.
Apparently a West coast vs East coast skate thing (like rap? 
). Went down a rabbit hole, and East coast varieties that generally run 1-3lbs of meat, while West coast varieties have 3-5lbs! So quite a bit larger for sure.
If that’s so, it explains how one could get a piece of skate wing thick enough to vaguely resemble a scallop, while avoiding the central cartilage layer. The wings I buy at my local greenmarket are about 6" X 10". Good for bay scallops, I guess.
Skates are easy to hook from just about any fishing spot in the San Francisco Bay and out past the GG Gate. A 50 lb’er is considered slightly above average, not unusual. A skate that size would yield chunks the size of baseballs or even softballs.
Gleaned from the web:
All I know is that about 45 years ago there was a shortage of scallops in NE. Sea scallops in particular. So the word went out that if the scallops were too big they were probably skate… Of course this was the same crowd my parents ran with. After reading The Godfather, they all wondered if a real horse head would be used in the movie.
But that was then and this is now. 
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Like these? 
I remembered I had some in my fridge that I need to use up, so good timing. These were pretty massive (smaller head of garlic for reference).
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I subscribe to a newsletter from an AgriFood Tech website (https://agfundernews.com/) that tracks venture capital/startups in this sort of tech/food space, and there are definitely companies out there all over the globe trying to do shrimp. New Wave Foods is one, and I’ve read about Asian companies trying to do the same.
So I imagine someone is attracting funding to try and do a vegan/vegetarian scallop too, though I don’t remember reading about that.
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