Rosie Makes Coconut Fried Shrimp And Fried Pickles.

There's just something about fried shrimp.

Frying makes shrimp taste ... shrimpier.

Don't know why, but it does.

And one of my favorite fried shrimp recipes

is coconut fried shrimp.

Here's my latest recipe.

Prepare the shrimp.

Peel the shrimp, leaving the tails intact, for dipping.  Remove black tract down the back.

It's not a vein.  It's the digestive tract.  So you're de-tracting, not de-veining.  

If you want to butterfly the shrimp here, take a paring knife and, starting at the intact tail, slice down the center of the shrimp's underside.  Open up the shrimp.  Butterflying just gives you more surface area for the batter to stick to, so more crisp, crunch frying. That's always a plus.

Batter for shrimp

1/2 cup flour

1/2 cup cornstarch

1 tsp Old Bay seasoning

1 tsp dried mustard

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp minced jalapeño

1/2 cup white wine

Combine all the dry ingredients with the jalapeño pieces.

Stir in the white wine.

You could use beer instead of the wine.

Didn't have beer today,

but I did have wine, so I used that.

Dip the shrimp in the batter,

letting the excess drip off.

Dredge the shrimp through a mixture of:

1 part coconut to 1 part panko breadcrumbs

You can just mix the coconut flakes and breadcrumbs

with the shrimp in a container and shakeshakeshake.

Have a heavy deep pot for frying.

Pour in about 2-3 inches of peanut oil

and heat to 350°-375°.

Fry in small batches so as not to 

lower the temperature of the oil.

 Low oil temperature = greasy fried food.

Proper oil temperature = crisp fried food.

Fry about 1 minute - until golden.

Drain shrimp on wire racks.

Oooooh...

What's that fried delicacy in the back?

Why, I believe that would be fried pickles!

Fried Pickles

You can use spears or slices.

We prefer dill slices.

Pat pickles dry with paper towels.

Using the same batter as for the shrimp,

dip the slices, and fry until golden brown.

Drain on wire racks.

I have two sauces for the shrimp and pickles.

Pineapple Dipping Sauce

1/3 cup crushed pineapple

2 TB Dijon mustard

2 TB horseradish

1 TB soy sauce

1 TB cider vinegar

1 TB brown sugar

juice of one lime

1 tsp minced jalapeños 

Combine all in small sauce pan and heat through.

Dipping Sauce

2 TB mayonnaise

1 tsp yellow mustard

1 TB sriracha sauce

1 tsp lemon juice

Mix well.

Enjoy!

The Hawthornes Attend Another Seafood Series Class At The Aquarium. Blue Water Grill And Raw Bar.

If you've been keeping up with me,

then you'll know that this season is all about lionfish.

Lionfish is not something you're going to find

at your local fishmonger's.

All the lionfish we ate was procured

by the NC Aquarium dive team.

This is all part of an effort

to diminish the rapidly increasing numbers

of the invasive lionfish in our Atlantic waters

and to introduce this species to both chefs and consumers.

You can see earlier preparations here:

Back in November, Chef Andy Montero

of Montero's Restaurant and Bar in Elizabeth city prepared lionfish.

And in March, Chefs Johanna and Justine Lachine

of Café Lachine in Nags Head

did their spin on lionfish.

You can click on the lionfish links above to learn
more about lionfish.

 Chefs Drew Thompson and Tim Gard
of Blue Water Grill and Raw Bar,
were our presenters at this session and
we dined on lionfish and 4 different preparations of oysters.
And you KNOW Rosie LOVES her oysters!

 Lionfish is white and flaky

and can be prepared as you would flounder or grouper.

 The chefs today simply pan-fried the fillets
and served them on a bed of rice noodles
tossed with slaw and an Asian-inspired dressing
and topped with a coconut lime sauce

For the noodle salad dressing:
1 cup soy sauce
 sesame oil
juice of 4 limes
3 TB sesame seeds

Mix all together and toss with noodles and slaw.
The slaw was composed of shredded red and green cabbage,
carrots, and red onion.

Now, I didn't put an amount on the sesame oil
in the above dressing recipe,
the reason being that on our recipe sheets
they printed "1 CUP sesame oil."
I'm thinking that is a typo,
because it sounds like a whole lot of sesame oil.
I might go with a few teaspoons of sesame oil.
Start there, taste test, and increase as needed.
But a cup???  I don't think so.
I didn't notice it at the time,
else I would have asked the chefs.

The lionfish was lightly seasoned and pan-fried,
set atop the bed of noodles and slaw,
and then topped with a Coconut Lime Sauce.

Coconut Lime Sauce
 1 15-oz. can coconut milk
1 cup sour cream
juice of 6 limes
salt and pepper to taste
3 sliced green onions
cilantro

On to the oysters.
 

I was in heaven today,
since Chefs Tim and Drew presented us with four
oyster preparations.

Our chefs are shuckin'!

Our first oysters were dressed with a mignonette,
which is basically a sauce or condiment made with shallots,
cracked pepper, and vinegar.

Mignonette
1 red onion, small dice or 2 shallots, diced
1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 cup red wine
1 TB sugar
2 big spoons fresh chopped parsley
s&p to taste
And give it a squeeze of lemon juice on top.

Pineapple Salsa with Tobiko Caviar
1 whole pineapple, small dice
1/2 red onion, small dice
1 tomato, small dice
10 green onions, thinly sliced
1 red bell pepper
juice of 3 limes
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 TB sugar
2 TB oil s&p to taste
Top with Tobiko.

I'm not a big fan of caviar.
Tastes like fish eggs to me...
BUT, this particular caviar wasn't bad at all.
In fact, I liked it.
It is Tobiko - flying fish roe.
And it's really pretty!

On to the Oysters Rockefeller.
As I've said before,
nobody knows the original recipe for Oysters Rockefeller
except someone at Antoine's restaurant in New Orleans,
(and they ain't tellin')
but everybody makes their own riffs on this dish.
However you make it, it's good.

Oysters Rockefeller
1/2 red onion, small dice
10 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1 cup bacon, chopped
4 oz. sambuca or pernod liqueur
1/4 cup cream
12 cups spinach
1 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
s&p to taste

Sublime.

Our fourth and last oyster dish.

New Orleans Garlic Butter
4 oz. beer
1 pound butter
20 cloveds chopped garlic
4 TB parsley
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
2 cups Parmesan cheese
s&p to taste

 Heh...
I pulled this picture off of Blue Water's Facebook page.
This is from our class.
And would you look?
 There's Rosie!!!
(Back row.  Far left.  Behind the lady in red.)
And Mr. Hawthorne is to my right,
off the grid, so to speak.

The Hawthornes always sit in the back,
far right side of the table,
and there's a reason for this.
It's my strategy and it worked like a charm this time.

When the chefs started serving,
they brought two platters of oysters -
one to the front, left side of the table
and one to the back. left side of the table.
All the participants took one oyster of the platter
and then passed the platter to their right.
The person at the front table far right passed
the platter to the back table.
SO.....
what happened was that both oyster platters
ENDED UP WITH ME!!!!
MWAHAHAHAHAHA!
Naturally, being me,
I didn't pass the platters on to anyone,
so I ate about a dozen or so oysters.
Like I said, it worked like a charm!
Rosie is nothing if not resourceful.

Of course,
after class, I had to go speak to the animals.

The turtles are always happy to see me!

Mr. Hawthorne Picks De Crabs For Crab Cakes!

 

Sunday lunch.
Crab cakes with a pineapple salsa.

I have a pound of crab meat in the bowl.

 Mr. Hawthorne was kind enough
to steam the crabs and pick the meat.

Crabs are plentiful now.

They're big and plump and juicy as they fatten themselves up

before they take a little over-winter rest in the bottoms.

As the water temperatures start to fall and the days get shorter,

the crabs fill up on food to last them through winter.

They burrow themselves into sandy bottoms to spend the winter.

The crab buries himself by forcing his

abdomen backwards into the bottom

with swift snapping motions.

The crab also picks and claws at the bottom

with its hind walking legs and flips the sand away

 with the paddles of its swimming legs.

Takes a few minutes and the crab is at a 45° angle
with only his antennae, the tips of his eye stalks,
and his breathing channels visible.
The crab does not hibernate.
The crab lies dormant.
Usually November through May.

It's Crab Cake time right now.
 At the Hawthornes'.
we take advantage of the season and eat accordingly.

 

 On to the Crab Cakes:

 Crab
8 oz crab meat

1 TB sliced scallions
1 TB minced green pepper
squirt of yellow mustard
1 egg, beaten
1 TB panko

Old Bay seasoning
ground salt and pepper to taste
additional Panko for breading
 Mix all ingredients together
except for crab meat and additional panko.
Gently, fold in crab meat.

Now wait to see how we form our crab cakes.

 Lightly mix ingredients

You don't want to break up the meat.

 Place a biscuit cutter or short tin can on waxed paper

and sprinkle a thin layer of panko on the bottom.

Spoon crab meat mixture into the mold.

 Sprinkle more panko over top

and press down with the back of a spoon.

 

 You want tight little packages full of crab meat.
Look at those chunks!
This is why you don't mix the crap out of
your crab mixture.

You can either fry them up now and eat them
or you can wrap them individually in plastic wrap
and put them in a freezer bag, destined to the deep freeze.
And, by the way, these freeze very well.

In January and February, we'll be eating crab cakes!

To cook:

 

 Add one tablespoon each butter and oil to a hot skillet.

When butter bubbles (350°), add in crab cakes.

2-3 minutes each side.

Remember not to crowd the pan.

Turn over.
Cook another short 2 minutes or so,
then drain on paper towels.

And serve ...

with my pineapple, orange marmalade,
roasted red pepper, horseradish, and lime zest salsa.

Pineapple Salsa

1/4 cup orange marmalade

1/2 cup finely chopped pineapple

2 TB roasted red pepper, minced

1 TB horseradish, drained

zest of 1/2 lime

Combine all ingredients.

Mix well.

Refrigerate for 30 minutes to allow flavors to develop.

Please enjoy.

You can thank me in the morning.

Rosie Makes Coconut Shrimp.

 As you know,

the Hawthornes love their shrimp.

Every August-September,

we're buying shrimp 5-10 pounds at a time,

depending on size,

stocking up for the winter.

Mr. Hawthorne gets nervous 

if we have less than 50 pounds of shrimp in the freezer.

The shrimp are big now,

so we're hoarding them,

hoping they'll get even bigger

and hoping that a hurricane won't blow through,

driving the shrimp out to sea and

 ending this season's shrimp harvest.

Today, I'm making beer batter fried coconut shrimp

with a pineapple salsa.

Pineapple Salsa

6 slices of pineapple, finely chopped

1 roasted red pepper, chopped

1/3 cup orange marmalade

1/2 red onion, chopped

2 TB horseradish

1 jalapeno, seeds and ribs removed, minced

zest of one lime

Add it all together and taste test.

If you want more of something,

add it.

Choppie, choppie.

Roasted red pepper.

Orange marmalade.

Chopped red onions.

Jalapeno.

Horseradish.

Lime zest.

 Pretty.
 

 While I was making the salsa,
 Mr. Hawthorne prepared the shrimp.

He pulled the heads and shells off, leaving the tail.

Then he de-veined the shrimp.

Actually, de-veining is a misnomer

since no vein is involved.

What you're removing is the digestive tract 

which runs along the back.

Next I butterflied the shrimp.
I work on paper towels.
Helps to stabilize the shrimpie
and you can easily wipe shrimp parts off your knife.

Turn the shrimp on its back

and run a knife down the middle where that line is,

cutting through the shrimp.

That's not a vein either.

It's a nerve.

I use a paper towel to pull that slippery thingie out.

Butterflied shrimp.

Next I prepared the batter and coating mixture.

Beer Batter

2 cups flour

1 cup cornstarch

1/2 tsp freshly ground sea salt

1tsp freshly ground pepper

1 tsp cayenne powder

12 ounces beer

 pineapple juice

Combine dry ingredients.

Whisk in beer until you get a smooth batter.

If batter is too thick,

add in a little pineapple juice to thin it.

You want a thin pancake batter consistency.

Coating Mixture
equal parts coconut and panko breadcrumbs

Holding the shrimp by the tail,

dip two at a time in the Beer Batter,

sliding the shrimp up the side of the bowl 

to get excess batter off.

Next dredge the shrimp in a mixture

of one part sweetened coconut flakes

and one part panko bread crumbs.

Heat at least 2 inches peanut oil to 350°.

Fry 6 shrimp at a time until golden.

About 75 - 90 seconds.

Drain on paper towels.

Serve with pineapple salsa.

My assembly line is ready.

Butterflied shrimp on left,

beer batter,

panko/coconut mixture,

hot oil,

paper towel lined rack.

And there are 4 pints in the background
of Mr. Hawthorne's Salsa Ranchera that he canned the other day.

I enlisted Mr. Hawthorne's help

so we could go faster.

I battered and coated 6 at a time and ...

...  he fried them.

By the time I had the next 6 shrimp ready,

he was done frying the last batch.

Serve with pineapple salsa and a few sprigs of cilantro.

This is one of my absolute favorite dishes.