Riverside Ovens
Test Kitchen

 













"In contrast, a bunch of sweet basil, the kind with big fleshy floppy leaves, fills the kitchen with a quite violently rich spice smell as it is pounded up with Parmesan, garlic, olive oil and walnuts for a pesto sauce for pasta. Again, action has to be taken immediately." – Elizabeth David, from "Summer Holidays"



When the buyer of seafood stands over the seafood section at the local grocery, there will always be a slight roulette wheel of luck to spin when betting on the freshness of the shrimp. The shrimp inside the cases is often at least partially frozen and we can't help but hope that once it melts with the assistance of lukewarm water under the kitchen faucet, some native taste will have been preserved and that what we are eventually eating doesn't taste like some manmade version of the beautiful little sea creature. If you walk across the aisle, there will always be the plastic containers parading

perfectly aligned mid-small sized shrimp, merely ready to be de-tailed, sometimes with nothing more than a swift bite of the teeth, and hope as well preserving some of its shrimpness.  Needless to say, how we pick our own for the recipe Provencal-style makes all the difference. That, and a few other rules that I have struggled through over the years.  I have found that I want a goal or two in mind for my shrimp before I even dive-in, so to speak, into the seafood concoction. I don't want the shrimp to be a waste of the fine food or time; such a delicate, intricate, uniquely sea worthy food that took so much work to get here in the first place should be cooked with perfection in mind.  I need the shrimp to be rinsed and fully defrosted; I would like for them to carry at least some seasoning and so take no time at all in choosing lemon pepper; if not over seasoned, the shrimp will come to taste more like shrimp than sodium, which is the key to all cooking, but that the whisper of lemon, the bite of pepper, will form an elegant crust.  Heat 2 tbsp of oil in the pan, let the shrimp swirl around in the oil by a smooth wrist twirl or flip, making sure that the skins do not stick to the surface.  Brown on each side all the while waiting for that particular aroma that only shrimp holds to move around the oven and on into the rest of the house. Snap one in the mouth. It should be hot as forged iron. In this, seasoned, hot, browned, we have something of little rounds of pre-cut seafood steak, really, less dense, but we always sense a muscular sort of protein that is very satisfying.

With a perfect shrimp, all the rest is window dressing.  Cooked vegetables consist of a diced zucchini, multiple sweet peppers, charm tomatoes and diced yukon golds. All of this will pan fry soft, but not mushy, and, along with a tomato paste, serve over the shrimp as an acidy salad over the stark bite of

the shrimp.  If the need seems to arise for something in the left hand to scoop all of this up, slide another shrimp a little closer to the fork, or absorb a touch of the paste, there is an answer in the form of a small baguette, also pan friend in oil on both sides, slid across the face by a split garlic clove, then lathered with an aioli. At the time of the bite that includes each of these, the true war will be whether it is the still steaming shrimp or the garlic infused aioli that wins out. This is the fun of buying the right shrimp.