Recently in Seafood Category

There's one frozen-food case at Zuppardo's grocery on Veterans, right by the cold cuts and hot dogs, that has a bunch of specialty frozen items from local/regional companies. It's an interesting selection of items, and these caught my eye:



I'm always on the lookout for good frozen-food items, because, like many families, we're running around with school actitities, music lessons, and Boy Scouts. (Also, Mrs. YatPundit doesn't cook much when I'm traveling.) The package felt heavy for two so they looked worth experimenting with. Opening up the package, they looked pretty good. Directions were to either pan-saute for 3 minutes on either side or to pop them into the oven for 15 minutes. Keeping with the notion of making this easy, I put them in the oven; no frying pan to clean.

The package also had a small seasoning packet to use for a sauce. The instructions said add some water to the seasoning:



Then some mayo to make a sauce:



After 15 minutes they were indeed ready:



Taste was pretty good, not too spicy, but not bland, either.

Carnival Brands is on the web, and these (and other items) can be ordered from them.

NOTE: This post got trashed in the switch to MT4.1, so reposting... The Brother Martin - St. Augustine football game was this afternoon. We stopped at the grocery on the way home, and I saw some great portobello caps in the produce section. I thought, instead of using a soufflee' ramekin for the crabmeat au gratin, what if I spooned it into a 'shroom? And off we go... Da Stuff: 1lb lump crabmeat 1/2 pint heavy cream 1 cup white wine 3tbsp flour yellow onion green onion garlic creole seasoning white pepper salt olive oil or butter for sauteeing cheddar cheese Usually a recipe such as this would call for the "holy trinity" of onion, celery, green pepper, but I made some veal with the trinity earlier in the week, so I went with just onion and green onion tonight. Told ya, these portabello caps were nice! I sliced off the stems, chopped them, and tossed them into the mix. Sautee the onions, green onion, and mushroom in a bit of olive oil. You can use butter here, but my contriubtion to limiting my development of clogged arteries is to go with olive oil. Add a bit more butter or olive oil, then sprinkle the flour on top of the translucent onion. This is a quick-and-dirty roux, because we don't need the flour to brown since the finished product is essentially a white sauce. While making the white sauce, I tossed the 'shrooms under the broiler for a couple of minutes Add the wine and heavy cream to the onion/flour mixture, then fold in the crabmeat. Remove from the heat. Taste the finished crabmeat filling for heat content. Add salt, creole seasoning, and white pepper to taste. Be careful with commercial creole seasoning--both Zatarain's and Tony Cachere's are high in salt. If you're sensitive to salt, make your own, or work with the components directly. spoon the filling into the ramekins, or, in this case, the 'shroom cap. cover 'em with cheese! Now, this is why the people who work with my wife don't like me. I spooned some of the filling into a microwavable dish and then topped it with the cheese, which is what I did with the mushroom and the ramekin. Now she's got lunch for a day next week. Bake in a 350F oven for 10 minutes to melt the cheese and re-heat the filling. Wife didn't want the other 'shroom, so I chopped it up and sauteed it in some white wine. Add an ear of white corn and a Binder's pistolette, and eat! The wine was a bit unusual for this dinner, a Moselle Riesling. It worked.

NPR' s "All Things Considered" did a piece yesterday on the struggling recovery of Louisiana's shrimp industry post-storm.  It's interesting that this ran the day after I made quickie Shrimp Caesar Salad:



The story explains that Louisiana shrimpers are still struggling because not only do they have to contend with the issues of storm recovery, but also depressed prices because of foreign shrimp imports.  Imported shrimp are everywhere, even in my favorite suburban New Orleans grocery store.



They may be imported from Thailand, but that pound of shrimp was convenient.  They weren't cheap, though, at $10/pound.  The Caesar salad package is also a quickie item.  I don't like the dressings that are usually included with these ready-to-serve salad packages, so I picked up some local Caesar dressing.




Sal and Judy's is a very popular restaurant on the Northshore, and they've branched out into their own line of products.  Given the numerous Caesar dressings on the grocery shelf, I punted and went local.



The shrimp were pre-cooked, and that's one of the big issues the local shrimpers have with the imports.  The shrimp are farm-raised, then peeled, steamed, and packaged.  Unlike New Orleans boiled shrimp, these look good, but they're bland and boring.




This is what makes the difference between bland-and-boring and the shrimp we know and love down here, Crab Boil.  It says right on the bottle that Zatarain's Crab Boil is "concentrated,"  but that's an understatement.  When boiling shrimp, the bottle says to use one tablespoon for five pounds of raw shrimp.  That's one tablespoon for five pounds of head-on, unpeeled shrimp.  In other words, if you spill this stuff, call for a hazmat cleanup.

The Thai shrimp were frozen, so I defrosted them for a few minutes in the microwave.  I added two drops of Crab Boil to the water in the container, mixed it all up a bit, and microwaved them on high for a couple of minutes.  Boiling the water in the dish generated a good bit of crab-boil steam, which helped improve the flavor.



With the shrimp as done as they'd ever be, it was time to make the salad.  The easiest way to make sure you don't put too much dressing on the salad is to pour it in first.  Coat the bottom of a mixing bowl with the dressing, then add the lettuce to it.



Add some croutons and toss it all together. 



In spite of the crab boil, the shrimp were missing some of the magic, so I sprinkled some creole seasoning over them and the salad.  It did give them a bit of a kick as well as adding some more color to the plate. 

Total time to fix and serve this is about fifteen minutes. 

The bottom line on the shrimp is simple:  the imports are boring.  In the future, I'll buy raw shrimp and boil or saute them myself.  The ease with which these pre-cooked shrimp can be served up makes them tempting, but they're just not the same!

This is one of the easiest New Orleans dishes to make, and it's fantastic if you're not afraid of butter. Unlike "shrimp on the barbie," when New Orleanians think of "barbecued" shrimp, they really mean baked with lots of butter and pepper. The dish was invented at Pascal's Manale Restaurant, uptown on Napoleon Ave., and it's their signature entree to this day.

OK, let's get started.

The ingredients are simple:

5 pounds jumbo raw shrimp

1 pound butter

1 Valencia orange

Black pepper

Cayenne

The original recipe from Manale's calls for using a bit of olive oil as well as butter, add a bit of thyme, and to use lemons instead of an orange. I'm more of a purist. Food critic and local radio personality argued for doing it simpler on his radio show one time, I tried it and liked it.

A note about butter: use it or just don't cook this dish. It's about the butter flavor and making a buttery dipping sauce. If your diet doesn't include butter for whatever reason, take a pass on this and do boiled shrimp. I'll do boiled shrimp soon and you'll see that they are tasty goodness when done right as well.

Raw shrimp from a good seafood place are usually sitting in clean ice water, but i like rinsing them off at home, anyway.

Spread the shrimp out in a baking dish with sides to it. Don't just use a pizza pan, or the sauce will be uncontrollable.

Slice up the butter and place it on top of the shrimp. This 5-pound batch of shrimp made two pans, so two sticks for each. Sprinkle a lot of black pepper on top. Don't skimp! Be a little more careful with the cayenne, but remember, liberal is a good word.

Zest the orange and sprinkle the zest over the shrimp. Squeeze the juice of half an orange over each of the two pans.

You're going to want some good french bread to go with the shrimp, the better to soak up the butter sauce with!

Voila! To serve, either just plop the pan down and let everyone reach in, or dish the shrimp up into large soup bowls. Serve with cold beer or a crisp, dry, white wine.

After all the weeks I've been away from home, one of the first things I did was make something uniquely New Orleans for dinner last Friday night. A lot of local places do a variant on crawfish pasta with a cream sauce, and I'm constantly experimenting with my own version. I told daysinger I'd take photos, and so here they are:

The Basic Ingredients

In the photo, you see a pound of frozen crawfish tails, 1 cup heavy cream, Manda tasso, some pre-cut "Holy Trinity," and bow-tie pasta.

Getting Started

The "Holy Trinity" of Creole cooking is, of course, onions, green pepper, and celery. I cheated for this dinner and bought pre-chopped veggies. Now they're sauteeing in about 3tbsp of olive oil. Some folks use butter here, but I'm trying to be responsible. Of course, that's like drinking a diet coke with a big mac, given the cream sauce.

Tasso!

Tasso is smoked, spicy pork loin. It's VERY spicy, to the point that you really don't need a lot of additional pepper in a dish that includes tasso. Usually I'd sprinkle some creole seasoning on the sauteeing veggies, but here I just added a cup or so of diced tasso.

Making the sauce

When the onions get transparent, sprinkle 3tbsp of white flour over the top. This is the quick-and-dirty way to thicken a sauce. Since we're not looking for a dark roux here, we can get away with doing things more-or-less in reverse. When the veggie-tasso-oil-flour mix gets all thick and starts to ball up, add 1/2 cup of chicken (or fish) stock (I used chicken), and 1/2 cup of wine, stirring constantly. Continue to add stock and/or wine to thin the sauce out a bit more if necessary. To this, add the 1 cup of heavy cream, again stirring constantly. Simmer on low heat.

Shrooms...

Just to be a bit different this time, I added about a cup of sliced "baby bella" mushrooms.

Crawfish...

The crawfish are already cooked, so they go in last. Continue to simmer and cook the pasta.

Dinner!

When the pasta is al dente, drain and toss with the sauce. Serve with lots of french bread, and some dry white wine.

My teen is one week away from being a "Ramblin Wreck from Georgia Tech," and hopefully also "a hell of an engineer!" As such, we've been allowing him a bunch of "last request" meals. He specified Bud's Broiler, shrimp po-boy, grilled steak, and bbq shrimp.

I did the bbq shrimp tonight. 5 pounds of jumbo (15-count) shrimp, spread out on pizza pans. slice up two sticks of butter for each pizza pan. liberally sprinkle each with black pepper, lemon pepper, cayenne, and sage. Bake for 25-30 minutes until shrimp are pink and tender. Serve with french bread for dipping in the butter.

I brought home a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc from Starke's, but it was bad. Which is a shame, because we've got a bunch of wine in the restaurant...plan b was a bottle of woodbridge sauvignon blanc that was just fine. all is good in the world...

We're back after vacation! Technical difficulties forced us to cancel the podcast last week (mainly because we were in Boston and the internet connection was problematic). But we're home and hot, so it's time for more cooling Summer Creole Recipes:

The Podcast (25:17, 31.6meg)

Marinated Shrimp

1/2 cup olive oil or salad oil
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
1/8 teaspoon white pepper
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
1/4 cup chopped scallions
1-2 clove garlic, peeled and halved
1/2 sweet red pepper, cored,seeded and cut into short fine strips
1 teaspoon drained capers, chopped
1 stalk celery, thinly sliced crosswise
2 lbs cooked large shrimp, peeled and deveined
4 lettuce leaves (optional)

1. Combine the oil, vinegar, lemon juice, worcestershire sauce, salt, peppers and cayenne in mixing bowl.
2. Lightly beat together with a wire whisk.
3. Add the scallions, garlic, sweet peppers, capers and celery and stir to mix.
4. Fold in the shrimp.
5. Cover closely and marinate in the refrigerator for atleast 3 hours.
6. Discard the garlic before serving (unless you can eat garlic like I can).
7. If desired, serve in lettuce leaf cups.

Poached lemon chicken

Makes 12 servings

6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut lengthwise into one-inch-wide strips
3 leeks, washed, trimmed and cut lengthwise in half
2 to 3 cups chicken broth
Salt, cayenne and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Put the chicken breasts, leeks and broth in a large saucepan. Cover with chicken broth and season with salt, cayenne and black pepper. Simmer until tender. Cool. Pack in an airtight container with some of the broth to keep the chicken from drying out.

Serve with crème fraiche flavored with fresh lemon juice and chopped fresh dill, or this curry mayonnaise.

Curry mayonnaise

Makes about 1 cup

1 cup mayonnaise
1 teaspoon curry powder (try the Madras curry powder if you can find it)
1 teaspoon horseradish
1 teaspoon tarragon vinegar
1 tablespoon minced onions
¼ teaspoon hot sauce
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Combine all of the ingredients in a small mixing bowl and whisk to blend well. Store in an ice chest until ready to serve.
Double or triple the next recipe, store it in an airtight container and bury it in ice in an ice chest.

Shrimp and orzo salad

Makes 4 servings

6 cups water
2 teaspoons (or more to taste) salt
1 ½ teaspoons cayenne
2 pounds large shrimp, deheaded
½ cup orzo pasta
2 cups mayonnaise
¼ cup Creole mustard
1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh dill
2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh parsley
3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
½ pint cherry tomatoes
Freshly ground black pepper
Hot sauce to taste (optional)

Put the water, salt and cayenne in a large pot and bring to a boil. Add the shrimp, allow water to come back to a boil and cook for three to five minutes. Remove the shrimp from the pot and spread the shrimp on a large platter to cool.

Add the orzo to the water in the pot and bring to a boil. Cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 10 minutes. Drain and cool.

Shell and devein the shrimp, and cut into bite-size pieces. Combine the mayonnaise, mustard, dill, parsley and lemon juice in a large bowl and whisk to blend.

Fold in the shrimp, the orzo and the cherry tomatoes. Season with more salt if needed, the black pepper and the hot sauce if using. Store in an airtight container and chill.

Barbecued Shrimp Tangipahoa

Ingredients:
36 (16–20 count) shrimp, head-on
½ pound butter
¼ cup olive oil
¼ cup minced garlic
¼ cup minced purple shallots
½ cup sliced green onions
3 tbsps chopped basil
3 tbsps chopped oregano
3 tbsps chopped rosemary
2 tbsps chopped thyme
½ cup Worcestershire sauce
1 cup beer
salt and cracked black pepper to taste
Creole seasoning to taste
Louisiana hot sauce to taste

Method:
Preheat oven to 350°F. In a 13" x 9” baking dish with a 2-inch lip, spread shrimp out evenly. In a 1-quart saucepot, heat butter and oil over medium-high heat. Add garlic, shallots, green onions, basil, oregano, rosemary and thyme. Sauté 3–5 minutes to flavor butter with herb mixture. Blend in Worcestershire and beer. Pour hot mixture over shrimp. Season with salt, pepper, Creole seasoning and hot sauce. Overseason because shells will prevent meat from absorbing most flavors. Place in oven and stir shrimp once during cooking. Cook 15 minutes or until shrimp are pink and curled. Do not overcook, as shrimp will become hard to peel. Place 6 shrimp in each of 6 soup bowls and top with equal portions of herbed-butter sauce. Serve with New Orleans French Bread.

Creole Cream Cheese Cheesecake with Praline Sauce

Makes One 9” cheesecake

½ lb Butter
4 C Graham cracker crumbs

2 ½ lbs Cream cheese
8 oz Creole cream cheese (*must be made 3-4 days in advance)
6 ea Eggs
2 C Sugar
2 T Vanilla

2 C Pecans
2 C Praline liqueur
1 ½ C Dark karo syrup
½ lb Butter
½ C Corn starch
1 ½ C Water
1 T Vanilla
Pinch of salt

To make Graham Cracker Crust:
Melt butter and allow to slightly cool. Pour melted butter over graham cracker crumbs in a large bowl. Mix butter and graham cracker crumbs with a wooden spoon until incorporated. Spoon graham cracker mixture into a 9” spring form cheesecake pan. Firmly press the mixture across the entire bottom of the pan and about half way up the sides of the pan. Use a small measuring cup or juice glass to tightly pack the crust against the pan if necessary. Crust should be about ¼” thick to avoid crumbling.

To make Creole Cream Cheese Filling:
Preheat oven to 300°. Mix cream cheese, Creole cream cheese, eggs, sugar and vanilla in food processor until smooth, occasionally scraping down the sides of processor bowl to ensure that ingredients are thoroughly incorporated. Depending on the size of your food processor, you may need to do this in two batches. Spoon filling into graham cracker crust lined pan. Bake for 2 hours, or until set. Chill for at least 6 hours, ideally overnight, before cutting to serve.

To make Praline Topping:
Evenly spread pecans on a sheet pan and lightly toast in a 300° oven. Bring praline liqueur, karo syrup and butter to a simmer. Make a slurry (culinary term for a thin paste) with cornstarch and water. Temper slurry with a small amount of the hot liqueur, syrup and butter, then add the slurry to the remaining hot liquid, whisking continuously. Continue cooking until mixture begins to thicken. Add toasted pecans, vanilla and salt. Allow topping to cool to room temperature. Spoon over each slice of cheesecake immediately before serving.

Simple Summer Seafood

The Podcast

Sauteed Shrimp with Creole Mustard Sauce

2 pounds fresh frozen shrimp (30-count, head-off) or 4-5 pounds head-on raw shrimp
3-4 tbsp olive oil
creole seasoning

Rinse off the shrimp and peel them. Butterfly the shrimp by slicing them lengthwise, 1/2 to 2/3 the length of the shrimp. Saute in a medium-hot pan with the olive oil, 4-5 minutes. Sprinkle creole seasoning on the shrimp while sauteeing. Serve with Creole Mustard Sauce.

Creole Mustard Sauce

1/2 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup Creole mustard
1/2 teaspoon prepared horseradish
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
Juice of 1 lemon

Whisk all of the ingredients together until thoroughly blended. Serve as a sauce for fried soft-shell crabs or crawfish, or any fried shellfish.

Cajun Risotto Cakes With Bayou Sauce

1 package Zatarain's Jambalaya Mix
1 lb Andouille sausage, diced
½ lb crabmeat
½ cup onion, diced
1 celery stalk, diced
1 green pepper, diced
1 egg
2 Tbsp mayonnaise
4 cans chicken broth
½ stick butter
Flour
Peanut oil

Sauté sausage, onion, celery, green pepper for about 8 minutes over medium heat. Add chicken broth and Jambalaya Mix and cook for 25 minutes. Add crabmeat and continue to cook and stir occasionally for 5 minutes. Stir butter into mixture and remove from heat. Store mixture in refrigerator for at least 1 hour. Add egg and mayonnaise to mixture. The mixture should be thick by now. Sprinkle flour about ¼ inch thick on a cutting board. Spoon about a tablespoon of the mixture onto the flour to make one cake. Flatten the cake with a spatula, and flip it to dredge the other side in the flour. Heat nonstick skillet and add about ¼ inch of the peanut oil over medium heat. If the oil starts to smoke, it's too hot! Fry the cake until golden brown, about 4 minutes for the first side and 3 minutes for the second. Mix sauce ingredients and serve over cakes.

Serve with Creole Mustard Sauce

Crawfish and Artichoke Risotto with Crispy Eggplant

* 1 tablespoon olive oil
* 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
* 3/4 cup chopped onions
* 1/4 cup chopped red bell pepper
* 2 teaspoons chopped garlic
* 2 cups Arborio or Carnaroli rice
* 1 cup dry white wine
* 5 to 6 cups shrimp or chicken stock, simmering in a saucepan
* Juice of half a lemon
* 2 teaspoons salt
* Freshly ground black pepper
* 1/2 cup chopped green onions
* 2 cups artichoke hearts, cooked, trimmed and quartered
* 1/2 pound cooked crawfish tails, with fat if possible
* 1/2 cup heavy cream
* 3/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
* 1/4 cup chopped parsley
* 1/2 cup flour
* 2 tablespoons Creole seasoning
* 1 large egg
* 1/2 cup milk
* 1 cup yellow cornmeal
* 1 medium eggplant, cut into 1/2 inch batons
* 1/2 cup olive oil

In a large saucepan heat oil over medium-high heat. When oil is hot, add butter and then onions, bell pepper and garlic and cook until vegetables are wilted. Add rice and sauté for 1 to 2 minutes, stirring constantly, until grains begin to look opaque. Add wine and cook until evaporated, stirring constantly. Add 3/4 cup of the stock, lemon juice, salt and pepper. Continue to stir constantly, adding additional stock in half-cup increments as liquid is absorbed by rice. After rice has cooked for 10 minutes, add green onions and artichoke hearts and cook for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Add crawfish tails, heavy cream, half of the parmesan cheese and parsley, and stir well to combine. Remove from heat, let sit for 5 minutes before serving, garnished with CRISPY EGGPLANT and remaining parmesan cheese.

In a bowl, combine the flour with 1 tablespoon of the Creole seasoning. In another bowl, whisk egg together with the milk. In a third bowl, combine cornmeal with remaining tablespoon of Creole seasoning.

Dredge eggplant batons in the seasoned flour. Transfer to the eggwash, then to the seasoned cornmeal, shaking off any excess.

In a large skillet over medium-high heat, heat olive oil until very hot. Add eggplant and fry, turning occasionally, until golden-brown on all sides, about 5 minutes. With a slotted spoon, remove eggplant to absorbent towels, and sprinkle with salt. Serve immediately on top of CRAWFISH-ARTICHOKE RISOTTO, garnished with remaining grated parmesan cheese.

Yield: 4 servings

Going through some of my e-mail, I noticed a flyer from Williams-Sonoma. They sell cedar planks for grilling, four for $19.

These are perfect for doing Emeril's Cedar-Plank Trout.