Shrimp recipes

Cafe Society
21

For today’s lunch, I improvised what turned out to be a pretty good dish: pasta salad with shrimp, canned mussels, surimi, avocado and garlic.

Soak shelled frozen shrimp for 15 minutes or so, washing them afterward to get rid of any remaining ice and bits of shells, legs, etc. Dry on paper towel. Examine mussels to remove any bits of “beard” (brown seaweed) and save the canning liquid (water, not spicy oil, but I guess that’d work too). Cut a garlic clove in half lengthwise, discard sprout and cook with shrimp and salt over low flame in small pan with good olive oil until shrimp change color. Add mussel canning liquid to pan. Dice avocado and surimi, mix everything (shrimp + cooking oil + mussel canning liquid) with cooked pasta and two tablespoons of pasta water. Refrigerate and eat cold. Pretty good, especially in very hot weather.

22

Cajun Peel’n’Eat shrimp Appetizer

Ingredients:

*Cooked and deveined - shell on - head off shrimp
*Extremely hot cayenne powder or other dangerous ground peppers
*Table salt

Mix cayenne and salt. Sprinkle over a plate. Coat shrimp with spice mix. Sprinkle a smooth layer of spice mix on the plate then place shrimp in an attractive pattern like a circle. In order to peel the shrimp you get the hot spice mix all over your fingers for a minimal volume of heat, or you scoop up more spice mix with your peeled shrimp if you can take it. It’s pretty dang easy to do.

Jalapeno Shrimp Poppers

Ingredients:

  • Large fresh jalapeno peppers

  • Cheddar cheese or any type that melts well

  • Peeled and deveined shrimp

  • Little bamboo skewers

  • Eggs (needed for dry battering, may be used in wet batter mix)

  • Batter Fry Mix

  • Sour cream

    1. Cut top off jalapenos, split down one side, and remove guts. Split down an opposite side if needed to fit the shrimp and cheese inside the pepper. It helps to rough up the skin of the pepper with a brush or dishrag to help batter adhere.
    1. Put a cleaned and deveined shrimp and chunk of cheese inside the pepper and hold in place with a bamboo skewer all the way through the pepper. Use more skewers if needed to hold the pepper closed.

  • 3a. If dry battering mix up an egg wash in a bowl. Use 1 egg:1/4 cup water or beer

  • 4a. Dip pepper in egg wash, coat with dry mix. Repeat

  • 3a. If wet battering mix up wet batter, retain some dry mix

  • 4a. Dip pepper in wet batter mix. If not well batter is not adhering well coat with dry mix and dip in wet batter again.

    1. Fry peppers in hot oil until golden brown. Let cool for a minute and remove skewers. Serve with sour cream or similar creamy stuff
23

Since it’s still hot, a lot of my favorite pasta based shrimp dishes feel heavy to me. This time of year I prefer something like this -

Served cool, not cold with a nice Thai-style cucumber salad. Admittedly, I pack more flavor into the rolls than the basic version this lists (although they suggest plenty of additional options): green onions and garlic seps being a favorite.

24

I buy a bag of frozen cooked shrimp and could eat the whole thing with cocktail sauce. But I found myself with a big container of cream cheese-based ‘lobster and crab dip’ (or spread). I heated it gently with some half and half, cooked some small pasta, mixed it all and added a good handful of thawed shrimp (I took the tails off). It was just delicious, and easy. There are some spreads better than others. I used a locally made one. Aldi and Trader Joe sell similar.

25

I made shrimp ‘tacos’ last night. I only marinated the shrimps in olive oil and a little taco seasoning, and gave them a quick fry. We used low-carb flour tortillas (hence the quotes around ‘tacos’), with cabbage, creamy fish-taco sauce (linked in the OP), and sliced avocado.