Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Shrimp Season is now open on the Gulf Coast

I am certainly looking forward to this summer with the shrimp season opening. I understand they will be pricey due to the increase of cost of fuel but the shrimp will still be a great item for summer salads, cold shrimp, fried shrimp and casseroles. I found something interesting on how to prepare the jumbo shrimp over at SEASONED WITH ABANDON. The recipe suggests cooking the shrimp in less time so as not to become tough and then stuffing the shrimp using crab meat. Here is the recipe:

Crab-Stuffed Shrimp
Serve 4 shrimp as an entree, or 1-2 as an appetizer.
For stuffing
1 cup chopped mushrooms (about 1/4 pound)
3 tablespoons minced shallots
1 tablespoon minced garlic (about 3 cloves)
3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh parsley leaves
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 pound lump crabmeat, picked over
1/8 cup minced ham or prosciutto
1/4 cup chicken broth
1/4 cup grated parmesan
1/4 cup white wine
24 Ritz crackers, crushed into coarse crumbs
For Shrimp:
16 jumbo shrimp (about 2 pounds), shelled
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/4 teaspoon paprika
Garnish: chopped fresh parsley leaves
Accompaniment: lemon wedges
Preheat oven to 375°F. and butter a large baking dish.
Make stuffing:In a large heavy skillet cook mushrooms, shallots, garlic, and parsley in butter over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, until softened and liquid mushrooms gives off is evaporated. Add ham and crabmeat and cook over moderately high heat, stirring, 3 minutes. Stir in broth, wine, parmesan and cracker crumbs and remove skillet from heat. Mixture should be fairly moist.
Butterfly shrimp by cutting lengthwise along inside curve, almost completely through. Split open shrimp and devein. Mound about 2 tablespoons stuffing onto each shrimp, pressing gently, and put shrimp, stuffed sides up, in baking dish. Melt butter and drizzle over shrimp. Add a small amount of wine or broth to the pan. Sprinkle shrimp with paprika and bake 20 minutes, or until stuffing is golden.
Garnish shrimp with parsley and serve with lemon wedges.
This is fantastic and will make a great meal along with salad and maybe a baked potato. What I like about it is there is no rich cream sauce and it is baked versus a fried shrimp platter.
Here is an idea for using summer squash in a casserole. I cannot find where it was posted but here is the recipe without any quantities.
My mom slices the yellow squash, puts sliced fresh tomatoes on top, and then sliced sharp cheddar cheese slices on top of that. Bake till veggies are tender. I'm sure you could use different cheese, too, but there's just something about cheddar cheese and tomatoes. Can't get much easier than this. I definitely want to make this even if in a small quantity.

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