Shellfish – Page 4 – Writing With My Mouth Full

Shrimp Hot and Sour Soup

Brrrr. It’s winter in New York City! This soup warmed the deepest of my organs.

Ingredients:
1 pound of shrimps with heads and tails saved, peeled and deveined
chicken stock
1 bunch cilantro, thoroughly rinsed
1 bunch watercress, thoroughly rinsed
2 red chilies
1 small knob of galangal or ginger, peeled and thinly sliced
1 small red onion, chopped
1 lemongrass stalk, white part only, pounded with a pestle
lime juice
fish sauce
sambal oelek
shrimp paste, to taste
peanut oil

1. In a large pot, heat some peanut oil and add the shrimp heads and tails until they turn orange, about 4 minutes.
2. Add the lemongrass and the ginger with the stock. Bring to a boil and then reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Strain the stock and discard the shells and heads. Return the stock to the pot.
3. Add lime leaves, scallions, mushrooms, cilantro and watercress. Cook for less than 5 minutes.
4. Add the shrimps and cook for another 3 minutes. Adjust the broth taste by adding lime juice, fish sauce, sambal oelek and shrimp paste.

I had enough crayfish meat and crayfish broth leftover from the crayfish rice that I decided to make soup. At first, I was just going to use the broth and add some vegetables, but after tasting it, I knew something was short. My mother said she imagined the soup to be thicker because the crayfish taste was so concentrated. So I put on my coat, braved the winter weather with pajamas on and ran to the corner deli and bought a can of corn and a pint of milk. Using a blender, I made my own creamed corn. I wanted to test it first before I used the rest of the broth so in a smaller pot, I simmered a small dollop of the corn with some of the broth. When the mother hen approved, I made a bigger batch good enough for four people at work the next day.

Ingredients:
2 pounds crayfish, washed
bacon
1 can of kernel corn
1 cup of milk
2 ribs of celery, cut in smaller pieces
1 red onion, halved
1 red bell pepper, finely chopped
1 green bell pepper, finely chopped
1 chayote, peeled and diced
salt, pepper, oil

1. Make crayfish broth. Separate the crayfish heads from the tails. Put the heads in a big soup pot with some water and let it boil. Add onion and celery ribs with some salt. Simmer until ready to use. Peel tails and devein. Chop in smaller pieces.
2. In a skillet, render fat off bacon until crisp. Remove to a plate lined with paper towel. When cool enough to handle, finely chop bacon. Set aside.
3. In a blender, purÃ©e corn while adding a little bit of milk slowly. The consistency should be creamy without being too thick.
4. In a soup pot, transfer the crayfish broth without the solids. Simmer and add the vegetables. Cook until the chayote is soft. Add a little bit of the creamed corn slowly until desired consistency. Season with bacon bits and pepper. Serve with country bread.

Related post/s:
How to cook your rice with crayfish

Crayfish Rice with Bacon

Tomatoe, tomatoh. Potatoe, potatoh. Crayfish, crawfish. No matter what you call these small lobster lookalikes, they’re good to go in a big soup pot. And you know what? They’re even better with bacon. They were selling them alive in Chinatown but they were left out in the cold–that made it easy enough to pull their heads from their bodies. I put all the heads in a soup pot to make broth while I chopped up some vegetables for this recipe. Peeling the tails was another story. It’s a lot of work with so little yield; I should have gotten more than two pounds. But in the end, my rice was delicious and it was even better with some barbequed pork.

Ingredients:
2 pounds crayfish, washed
bacon
4 ribs of celery, 2 finely chopped, 2 cut in smaller pieces
1 red bell pepper, finely chopped
1 green bell pepper, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 red onions, 1 finely chopped, 1 halved
3 cups rice
salt, pepper, oil

1. Make crayfish broth. Separate the crayfish heads from the tails. Put the heads in a big soup pot with some water and let it boil. Add the halved onion and the big celery ribs with some salt. Simmer until ready to use. Peel tails and devein. Chop in smaller pieces.
2. In a skillet, render fat off bacon until crisp. Remove to a plate lined with paper towel. When cool enough to handle, finely chop bacon. Set aside.
3. Using some of the bacon fat, sautÃ© garlic and onions. Add crayfish, celery and pepper and sautÃ© until tender. Season with salt and pepper. Add rice and 3 cups of the crayfish broth. Cover and cook the rice in medium fire. Check often and add more broth to keep it from drying. When rice is almost done, fluff with a spatula and mix until combined well. Turn off the fire, cover the pot and let the remaining heat finish cooking the rice.

Related post/s:
Crayfish Creamed Corn Soup

Shiso-Wrapped Tempura Prawns

For this recipe, I made my own shiso oil to drizzle the prawns with after flash-frying them, but I also used the leaves to wrap them. A toothpick can hold the leaf in place but I ended up using one of the prawn’s harder feelers as a replacement.

Ingredients:
5 prawns, peeled but with heads intact, deveined, feelers and arms chopped
5 shiso leaves
shiso oil
rice flour
club soda
red pepper flakes
lime
salt, oil

1. Wrap each prawn with a shiso leaf. Use a toothpick to keep the shiso leaf in place.
2. Make batter. In a shallow bowl, combine flour, red pepper flakes and salt. Drizzle club soda slowly and mix until it has that pancake batter consistency. Cover each prawn with batter.
3. In a skillet, heat some oil and flash-fry for about 4 minutes, turning each prawn gently with tongs after two minutes. Remove to a paper towel-lined plate and squeeze with lime juice. Serve immediately.

Bacon-Wrapped Scallops

I’m not sick of bacon just yet. The third yield from my first shipment of bacon became dinner. This would be awesome with some mashed potatoes on the side.

Ingredients:
6 pieces of large scallops
6 slices of bacon

1. Season scallops with salt, pepper and paprika. Wrap each scallop with a piece of bacon.
2. Using a skillet, sear each bacon-wrapped scallop until bacon is crisp and golden brown. Sear the side where the bacon ends first. Using tongs, gently turn them and cook the other sides. To make sure the bacon stays closed, sear the end again for the last few seconds. Remove to a paper towel-lined plate. Serve on a different plate after 1 minute.