I don't think this practice is very widespread, due largely to government inspections of seafood processing plants, but it has been done. Unlike "artificial crab" or "sea legs", which are openly offered as a less expensive alternative to real crab meat, these "artificial scallops" have not been presented as artificial. Rather, attempts have been made to pass them off as the real thing. Consequently, you are not likely to find any indication of their true nature on a menu. In a scallop, all that is eaten is the large adductor muscle which holds the two valves of the shell together (unlike clams or oysters, where you can eat everything but the shell). This makes them easy to counterfeit. All you need is a cylindrical punch of the right diameter and you can punch out "scallops" from any light-colored muscular tissue. A favorite source of such "scallops" has been the wide lateral "wings" of skates and stingrays. Once you remove the skin, you have a large, flat slab of whitish muscle, well suited for "scallop" punching. Paul M.