Tonight I taught a small evening class for guys only at Gilda’s Club. My goal was to inspire them to get into the kitchen and make some summer time food that was easy to prepare and most importantly, delicious.
The seafood counter at Whole Foods
We used three basic ingredients: shrimp, spinach and quinoa. I’m going to split this blog post into three separate ones so I can expand a bit about these ingredients. Let’s start with the shrimp!
I started out by visiting the seafood counter at Whole Foods the day before the class. I needed a pound of shrimp, cleaned and de-veined, I let the guys behind the counter to all that messy work! My choice was between sustainably farmed shrimp from Thailand or wild shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico.
Due to environmental concerns, these are not easy choices. The Pacific Ocean is now at risk of contamination from the ongoing nuclear disaster at Fukushima, Japan. Is it still safe to eat seafood from the Pacific? It’s difficult to get accurate information at this time. Fishmongers are now testing Pacific seafood with geiger counters.
As for the Gulf shrimp, there are lingering concerns whether seafood from the region is safe to eat. It’s been over a year since the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion and oil spill left more than 200 million gallons of oil and 2 million gallons of the dispersant Corexit in the Gulf of Mexico. Like the Fukushima situation, it can be tough to get an answer from an independent source as to whether there is contamination with oil or with the toxic dispersant.
Another source to help you clear up the question of what to buy is Seafood Watch, they have a cool pocket guide to seafood selection. You can even get it as a downloadable “app” for your smart phone!
Seafood Magic + Garlic
I chose the wild Gulf shrimp. Once I brought them home, I poured half a bottle of Chef Paul Prudhomme’s Seafood Magic on the shrimps and tossed them with some olive oil and a small amount of crushed fresh garlic.
That’s it! That’s all you have to do! I set it up the day before so that the flavors blend, you can do it the same day too.
From there all you need to do is saute the seasoned shrimp over medium heat until they are cooked through. Insanely easy!
You can enjoy these shrimp as an appetizer and skewer them with some toothpicks. Use some corn tortilla chips to dip in the leftover sauce!
OR, you can have these yummy shrimps for dinner which is what we did at Gilda’s. It was part of a meal along with some spinach and some quinoa. Click here to learn more about the rest of our meal.
