Sunday Gravy with yeah right: Request Line! Shrimp Scampi!

Good morning everyone!

Nice to be back in the saddle after DJ Taj filled in so astutely last week.

We’re coming into the home stretch for this season of Sunday Gravy. After today we have 4 more episodes and then we return ourselves to the brutality, futility, frustration, angst and over-caloric consumption of real motherfucking NFL football action.

Hot damn!

This season of Sunday Gravy has been kind of interesting due to it’s distinct lack of grilled items. We’ll have at least one grill recipe coming up and maybe a 2nd but without intentionally pissing off you good folks who live in the hotter climes, it’s been a real friendly summer up to this point out here in L.A. and I’ve been able to do more indoor cooking than usual.

Of course having mentioned that I’ve probably doomed us to a September and October of 173 degrees on average. You NEVER get away with an easy Summer completely. We’ll bake eventually, it’s just a matter of time. Shit a couple of years ago the hottest day of the year was the opening Day of the World Series in late October.

Which all means today’s recipe was done entirely indoors with zero assistance from the charcoal grill.

We’re gonna do another “Request Line” for today’s meal and throw down some shrimp scampi.

Our own Fronkenshteen asked specifically for shrimp recipes and Wakezilla had previously requested more seafood recipes so we’ll attempt to satisfy both of their requests.

Some of our previous seafood features include the following…

We’ve made shrimp egg foo young.

We’ve done us some goddamn beautiful shrimp and grits!

Holy shit was THAT good!

We’ve made jambalaya with shrimp.

Did ourselves a nice basic grilled shrimp – along with some fucking killer chipotle chicken.

“But yeah right,” you ask “Do you only use shrimp as your choice of seafood?”

Holy shit, almost guilty as charged.

We did do some lovely fish and chips – using cod.

And finally one of my all time favorite Sunday Gravy meals, macadamia crusted halibut steak.

Fucking hell, that was amazing.

So, looks like I’m going back to the shrimp well again.

One thing that’s different this time, I’m actually going to walk you through the process of peeling and de-veining raw shrimp!

See! Bonus material!

The idea and inspiration for today’s meal was simple. Fronkenshteen sent up the Bat Signal after purchasing some fresh shrimp, then asking for menu suggestions and I gave him a basic “note for note” recipe of this dish. Immediately after replying to his comment I thought “Hey! That’s a great idea for Sunday Gravy!”

Hence.

I was also in the mood for some fresh pasta and these two items play together VERY well.

No. I’m not going to give the recipe for the pasta for the 47th time. Find it here.

Just know that I did…

indeed make it from scratch.

Scampi is a simple, clean yet delicious preparation for shrimp, that really lets the shrimp step forward and be the star of the show.

How simple?

Let’s find right the fuck out.

Shrimp Scampi!

1 1/2 pounds of shrimp – peeled and de-veined. I used 15-20 count shrimp, so large or “jumbo”.

4 tablespoons of butter – divided in half

2 tablespoons of olive oil plus a little more to drizzle

4 cloves of garlic minced

1/4 teaspoon of red pepper flake or to taste

Salt and pepper to taste

1/2 cup of dry white wine – I used a pinot grigio of course

Juice of 1 lemon

1/4 cup of fresh parsley chopped

That’s it!

First thing, you’ve got to procure yourself some shrimp.

See? These are pretty decent size shrimp. They actually had a larger “colossal” shrimp on sale but I prefer the large or jumbo size.

The butcher counter at Ralph’s had a sign indicating that they would clean and prep your raw shrimp for you but where’s the fucking fun in that? Besides it’s an instructional opportunity!

These shrimp had the heads removed already because most folks freak their shit out if the head’s left on. These people have obviously not been to New Orleans where all shrimp are served with the head on.

To clean the shrimp, first rinse them in cold water then remove the shell or carapace. I do this by snapping off the tail and peeling off the shell like so.

The bowl to the left is for the peeled shrimp. I finish peeling all of the shrimp before we get to the next step. Believe me, you WILL want to do this next step.

Even though the shrimp have been peeled they are definitely not cleaned. We have to address this…

That line down the center is the shrimp’s vein or digestive tract or as I like to subtly put it its “poop chute.” We want to remove the poop chute.

Simply take the tip of a very sharp paring knife and give a tiny incision at the top of the vein and run it a little way down the line of the vein. You just need to get a hold of the slippery fucker and it slides right out thusly.

Very simple to do and only slightly disgusting. Repeat until all the shrimp have been cleaned.

Quick note here: this dish comes together really quickly – I mean just a couple of minutes so plan your pasta making or cooking accordingly. I rolled, cut, dried and cooked the pasta before I even started the cooking process.

Look! A plate of fresh pasta that’s ready to cook.

Here it is again in some boiling water!

Then we have another picture of the drained cooked pasta! Awesome!

I have no idea why I take so many goddamn photos sometimes. I just do.

Before we get to the cooking shit, you also want to prep everything. That means slicing

and juicing your lemon. You can also mince up your garlic, open the bottle of wine, while conveniently pouring yourself a glass and get in the spirit of things.

It also means chopping up your fresh parsley.

What we are going to do is set up our work station or “mise” or “mise en place.”

You long time readers may remember when I discussed the idea of a mise en place in more detail when we made this sexy motherfucker.

Corned beef hash.

Fuck me, now I want some fucking hash.

We basically want everything prepped and within arms reach.

Get out a deep skillet or Dutch oven and add in 2 tablespoons of butter and 2 tablespoons of olive oil and get this over a medium heat.

When the butter has melted and stopped sizzling, toss in the red pepper flake and garlic.

Cook this for just 2-3 minutes, we don’t want to burn the garlic.

Next season up the shrimp with some salt and pepper and get those little bastards in the pan.

These will cook just until pink. Maybe 2-3 minutes tops. You’ll only need to turn them once.

At this point, remove the shrimp from the pan and place them in a foil covered bowl to keep warm. Leave that glorious shrimp juice in the pan.

Next add in the 1/2 cup of wine and the lemon juice to the pan.

Bring this just to a boil then add in the last 2 tablespoons of butter. When the butter has melted get everything left into the pan.

That’s our cooked pasta and the parsley. Now get them shrimp in there. The fuck you waiting for?

Toss on some more salt and pepper to taste. Stir well to incorporate everything. At this point a little drizzle of olive oil over the entire proceedings would be lovely, so go ahead and do that.

You are fucking done!

That’s all there is to it.

Plate that fucker up! Serve with a nice salad of choice and some crusty bread and get after that shit.

That white wine we’ve been fucking around with goes textbook perfectly with this dish.

Let’s get a good close-up of that shrimp.

This dish IS shrimp. It’s the very essence of shrimpiness. It’s a shrimp-a-paloozza of flavor. Each ingredient and element of this dish is here to enhance and highlight the flavor of the shrimp. That’s why we chose raw shrimp for this meal and the fresher you can get the better.

It’s light, clean, has that brininess of the sea. The shrimp has a delicate “snap” to it. The garlic is present but not overpowering. The red pepper flake is just an accent, you won’t be overwhelmed by it. The pasta is fresh with that chew that you can ONLY get from fresh pasta.

You will actually feel, shit no other way to put this, healthy when eating this. You won’t feel bloated or stuffed when you finish you will feel enlightened. Elevated maybe.

This shit is perfect.

It proves the point that sometimes simple, quick, fresh preparation is best. The fewer ingredients the better delivery.

One more angle.

Yeah. That’s the good stuff.

There you go folks.

Fresh, simple and entry level easy.

Thank you good folks for following along. It’s always a pleasure. Enjoy the rest of your weekend and I’ll see you here next week.

PEACE!