All Things in Moderation

Admin Note:  Admin thread up for the weekend….please post questions, comments and observations there.  We want to hear from you.

When I turned 21, two things happened, my son was born and I was able to work as a waitress in a dinner house finally.  You couldn’t get a waitress job in a fine dining establishment until then because of the age requirement for serving alcohol.  I worked at two really up scale restaurants and those two jobs, working three or four long nights a week, are what kept me in school through my Masters.  I used to go in early occasionally at one of them to watch the chefs do their prep work, and that’s where I learned to make shrimp scampi.

As with many of the recipes I post here, the ingredients are approximations and you may need to be a little creative to make the recipe work for you.  I wish I had a picture to show you but I didn’t think of it when I made this dish on Jan. 1.

Shrimp Scamp

Serves 4

Ingredients:

2 lbs jumbo raw shrimp with shell on (about 5 or 6 per person)

1/2 lemon

1/4 cup melted butter

2-3 cloves of crushed garlic

1/4 cup parmesan cheese (I use Kraft not fresh for this recipe)

1/4 cup unseasoned bread crumbs

1 small jar capers

Directions:

Here’s the tricky part.  Cut the shrimp down the back until you’ve almost cut them in half but leave the little leggy things attached as well as the tail and shell.  You’re butterflying them from the back.  Clean the vein out and open them up and rinse and then drain on a paper towel.

Arrange shrimp in one or two shallow baking dishes with the little legs down, the flesh flattened out a little and facing up, and the tail bent a little so it points up.  Combine melted butter, lemon juice and garlic and drizzle over shrimp.  Combine bread crumbs and parmesan and sprinkle over shrimp.  Toss about 6 or 7 capers on top of each shrimp and broil for 7 to 10 minutes in the oven.

Voila!!!!

lmsinca

The World’s Most Ridiculously Easy Steamed Crab Legs

I think that I’ve mentioned before that I’m a big fan of Alton Brown (of “Good Eats” fame on FoodTV); he approaches food from a scientific standpoint and explains why the things happen that you do (and sometimes don’t) want to happen to make it come out right.  This is his method for making wonderful crab legs at home.

Hardware

• Pliers
• Large tweezers
• Wooden or rubber mallet
• Paper towels
• Plastic wrap
• Microwave oven

Software

• Ghee (yes, you could make it, but you can also buy it in Indian markets)
• 3 frozen crab legs from the butcher’s case at the store
• 3 fresh dill sprigs

Tear off a looooong piece of plastic wrap (30 inches or so).  Wet two paper towels and stack them one upon the other on the plastic wrap.  Break the legs into two sections each and lay them on the paper towels along with the dill sprigs.  Wrap the paper towels around the legs, and then the plastic tightly around the paper towels–you shouldn’t be able to see any of the crab shell peeking out.

Microwave on high for two minutes.

Break the shells open with the pliers and/or mallet and pull the meat out with the tweezers. Dunk it in melted ghee and devour.

Serves two (or one, if you’re me).

michigoose

OK, bsimon, do tell about the time you almost gave your girlfriend food poisoning for Valentines Day. . .

Filed under: recipes | 35 Comments »