Barbequed Shrimp
Misnomer
If there ever was a bad idea it would be barbequing shrimp. Shrimp are a delicate meat that will overcook in 15 seconds. Barbeque, on the other hand, is the application of smoke and low heat for a long time. The closest you could get to actually barbequing shrimp is blowing cigar smoke at them for an hour or two — which probably wouldn't taste particularly good and would be boring. Nevertheless, Cajun barbequed shrimp are delicious: they just aren't really barbequed.
They're also Mediterranean.
When I tell folks I'm a chef the standard question is, "What's your favorite food?" To which my answer is, "Which is your favorite child?" I love food in general, but what they're really asking is what do I cook at home. To that my answer is Mediterranean cuisine, which elicits the next query among folks who know food, "What do you call Mediterranean?"
I then wax rhapsodic about rosemary and thyme, pasta and fish, olive oil and lemon. I talk about how the common ingredients are treated differently on the northern (European) and southern (African) coasts. And if the questioner is perspicacious I end up in New Orleans and the Caribbean.
If you think about it these cuisines bear a great resemblance to (and were strongly influenced by) southern European and African cuisines. Although Caribbean and Cajun/Creole food tends to include the most distinctive New World ingredient, capsicum peppers, the other ingredients and the cooking techniques definitely show the Old World roots.
So barbequed shrimp, which are sautéed in butter with onions, peppers, and seasoned with thyme, garlic, and assorted ground peppers are, to my mind, essentially Mediterranean in character. And they're certainly not barbequed.
I shelled and seasoned some shrimp with Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning and some dried thyme and let them sit for about an hour. Next I sautéed the shrimp until not-quite done in a lot of butter and spooned them out onto a plate, leaving the butter behind.
Diced onions and green bell peppers went into the pan until translucent, then a clove of minced garlic. I finished the dish by adding a bit of white wine and some clam juice which I reduced a bit before stirring in a tad of arrowroot for thickening and then returning the shrimp to finish cooking along with a healthy dash of Tobasco sauce..
I served the shrimp on a bed of Basmati rice spiked with more of the Chachere seasoning, Very good — and spicy.
If there ever was a bad idea it would be barbequing shrimp. Shrimp are a delicate meat that will overcook in 15 seconds. Barbeque, on the other hand, is the application of smoke and low heat for a long time. The closest you could get to actually barbequing shrimp is blowing cigar smoke at them for an hour or two — which probably wouldn't taste particularly good and would be boring. Nevertheless, Cajun barbequed shrimp are delicious: they just aren't really barbequed.
They're also Mediterranean.
When I tell folks I'm a chef the standard question is, "What's your favorite food?" To which my answer is, "Which is your favorite child?" I love food in general, but what they're really asking is what do I cook at home. To that my answer is Mediterranean cuisine, which elicits the next query among folks who know food, "What do you call Mediterranean?"
I then wax rhapsodic about rosemary and thyme, pasta and fish, olive oil and lemon. I talk about how the common ingredients are treated differently on the northern (European) and southern (African) coasts. And if the questioner is perspicacious I end up in New Orleans and the Caribbean.
If you think about it these cuisines bear a great resemblance to (and were strongly influenced by) southern European and African cuisines. Although Caribbean and Cajun/Creole food tends to include the most distinctive New World ingredient, capsicum peppers, the other ingredients and the cooking techniques definitely show the Old World roots.
So barbequed shrimp, which are sautéed in butter with onions, peppers, and seasoned with thyme, garlic, and assorted ground peppers are, to my mind, essentially Mediterranean in character. And they're certainly not barbequed.
I shelled and seasoned some shrimp with Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning and some dried thyme and let them sit for about an hour. Next I sautéed the shrimp until not-quite done in a lot of butter and spooned them out onto a plate, leaving the butter behind.
Diced onions and green bell peppers went into the pan until translucent, then a clove of minced garlic. I finished the dish by adding a bit of white wine and some clam juice which I reduced a bit before stirring in a tad of arrowroot for thickening and then returning the shrimp to finish cooking along with a healthy dash of Tobasco sauce..
I served the shrimp on a bed of Basmati rice spiked with more of the Chachere seasoning, Very good — and spicy.
Technorati: Food | recipe | kevin d weeks | seriously good | barbequed shrimp | shrimp | seafood | cajun-creole
Labels: cajun-creole, recipe, seafood, shrimp
7 Comments:
The charming use of high-level vocabulary certainly adds a nice note to the delightful assortment of flavors in your recipe. I'm pleased to see that someone, aside from me, uses arrowroot. I hardly ever see it in a recipe nowadays.
Donna,
"The charming use of high-level vocabulary certainly adds a nice note to the delightful assortment of flavors in your recipe."
I choose to believe my readers are well-educated as well as persipcacious.
Why'd you shell the shrimp? It makes them easier to eat, of course, and the shells are good for stock, but I have found that shelling sacrifices some flavor.
Bill,
I shell them for exactly the reasons you mention. And ordinarily I would have used homemade shrimp stock instead of clam juice, but I was out.
I ain't got much on them elocution skillz, but I gots it on the spellin' front: "perspicacious" ;)
A friend just dropped off a few bags of fresh shrimp & scallops last night. A little 'bbq' shrimpage mixed into some grits... sounds like dinner!
S'kat,
i'm jest plum proud i even rememberred the werd.
I've got a bison flank steak to try out tonight, but I'll do the shrimp tomorrow night. It's been a while since I did a spicy shrimp.
Thanks
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