Friday, January 19, 2007

Pesto Shrimp Scampi

This has been one of my very favorite treats ever since I "stole" the recipe from the restaurant Pasta Bella (Seattle) and made it for my roommates in college. I actually just made the recipe up, based on theirs, so maybe I didn't really steal it. I made this recently for some friends and would you believe I accidentally grabbed a pint of egg nog instead of cream & dumped it in? I screamed so loud that Kyle thought I had chopped a finger off. Luckily it was still edible, just sort of sweet.

This cooks very fast, so have the ingredients ready and don't start until you are ready to eat.


Pesto Shrimp Scampi
Serves 2
1 lb prawns, peeled & deveined (no smaller than 26/30 per pound, the bigger the better)
3 Roma tomatoes, chopped
1 14oz can of quartered artichoke hearts
1/2 c whipping cream (or to taste - 1/4 c is enough to make it creamy)
1/4 of a fresh lemon
1 c of dry white wine (open a bottle to drink with dinner!)
Pesto
1 large bag of basil (not the tiny plastic containers)
1 head of garlic
1/4 c olive oil
Parmesan
lots of crusty bread

First, prepare the "pesto". (You could also buy good quality prepared pesto and omit some garlic, oil & the basil) In a food processor, chop up 4-8 cloves of garlic. Remove 1/2 of it & save. Add basil leaves (not the stems) to the processor and enough oil to get it all pureed together. 1/4 cup oil should be enough, and you can add up to 2T water to help get it mixed together. You should have about 3/4 cup pesto when you are finished.

Heat 2 T olive oil over medium high heat. Add shrimp, garlic & about 1/4 tsp of salt. Stir to coat and cook for a minute or so until the shrimp start to turn pink but are NOT cooked through.

Dump in the white wine & turn the heat to high so it simmers quickly. Add tomatoes & artichoke hearts & let the wine reduce down for about 2-4 minutes, depending on how big your shrimp are. If you boil too long, the shrimp will overcook, so be careful! Large shrimp give you more time to boil down the wine.

Stir in the cream and let it heat till bubbling again. Turn heat to low. Stir in the pesto & squeeze the lemon wedge over it all. Remove from heat, sprinkle with parmesan & grind some fresh pepper over the top.

Serve in soup bowls with lots of bread on the side to mop up the sauce. You can also put this over pasta, but its not as fun.

4 comments:

Jenny said...

Hi Kari..so fun to discover this. AND so inspiring! I exchanged recipes with my girlfriends this Christmas and really enjoyed it.

As for this recipe..why isn't it fun with pasta? I love pasta and more importantly- so does Jeff ;).

Have you tried Acini di Pepe pasta? It's sort of like Couscous. Very fun!

Oh, and I'd love to see photos of your recipes..just a thought.

Anonymous said...

We are IN LOVE.

This was a huge winner over at our home. Thank you for the recipe, Kari. I think this will go in my favourites file and "simple to impress company with" file (both of which aren't files, just so you know, more like huge messy stacks, but that's filing in some countries, right?!)

~Misha

Kari said...

The bread is fun because you get to eat with your hands! I love scooping up the sauce, tomatoes & artichokes with my bread - in fact me & my roommates would make one big communal bowl of it and only use bread to eat with (no silverware) like we were Indian or something. But pasta is great too. ; )

Anonymous said...

Your blog keeps getting better and better! Your older articles are not as good as newer ones you have a lot more creativity and originality now keep it up!