Author Lauren

Recipe Post- Shrimp Cakes

Lauren

A few tips and worthless info: Make sure you refrigerate these for an hour after you form them- otherwise they will fall apart on you. And serve with some jalapeño tarter sauce or green goddess sauce.  I’ll give you cliff note versions on those right here:

  • Jalapeño Tarter Sauce: Chop jalapeño, lemon, mayo, salt pepper. Capers. Don’t forget the capers.
  • Green Goddess Sauce:  Bunch of herbs (basil and parsley mostly). Yogurt. Lemon. Salt-y and pepper-y. Blender.

Also, this recipe calls for green onions. Or scallions. They’re the same thing, turns out, and I was an embarrassing age when realized that. Let’s just say it starts with “Twen” and ends with “ty-seven”. Oh, and coriander leaves and cilantro are the same thing. And cremini mushrooms are small portabella mushrooms. And… that’s all I can think of right now, actually. Wait- beet greens and Swiss chard are the same plant. There we go.

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And just to REALLY confuse things: this picture was titled “Spring Onion” -Image by Melanie Kuiper.  

1 lb. peeled and deveined US wild caught raw shrimp (large), roughly chopped*
1 large egg
2 green onions, sliced
2 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
1 Tbsp. minced fresh cilantro
1/2 tsp. salt
½ tsp. of ground black pepper
1.5 cups seasoned breadcrumbs
Olive oil

Peel and devein shrimp and roughly chop (about 6 pieces out of each shrimp). Combine with next 7 ingredients and form into patties roughly three inches across, or slightly smaller than palm sized for me and about a half inch thick. Add more breadcrumbs if needed to hold together. Refrigerate for one hour prior to cooking. Heat olive oil in pan over medium heat. Sauté 4 cakes per pan. Cook for 2-3 minutes per side, until shrimp is cooked through.

*And look- I don’t want to make it a thing: but do NOT buy farmed shrimp . Anyone who goes: “Well these things can survive in filth and contamination- think of the profit!” DO NOT EAT THAT END PRODUCT.

Grilled Zucchini Salad

Lauren

Love, love, love, love, LOVE me some grilled zucchini salad. So easy. So good. Keeps well. Tasty warm or cold. And AWESOME with some turkey and cheese in a toasted sandwich! And a total piece of cake to make! In fact- WAY easier than an actual piece of cake- not to get all literal on you or anything. This is a very fresh side dish and is also great served with grilled chicken breasts or grilled shrimp over a bed of lettuce to make a main dish. Not all sides can make that transition (you mean ALL we’re having is cabbage? Huh.) but this one can step up to that plate easily. Look at me: I can puns. I’m leaving it there, though.

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Photo by: Zsuzsa N.K. You know how difficult it is to find a picture of zucchini that doesn’t look wildly inappropriate? 

 

Ingredients:

2 zucchinis, halved lengthwise

1 avocado, diced

1 medium tomato, diced

Handful of flat leaf parsley, chopped finely

Juice of half a lemon

Olive oil

Salt and pepper
Heat griddle pan to medium heat. Halve your zucchinis lengthwise, drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Place zucchini on griddle pan, cut side down. Cook for about 3-4 minutes per side, you’re only looking for very light griddle marks and for them to still be firm, so keep an eye on them. Remove to another plate to cool. Dice your tomato, place in bowl, and sprinkle lightly with salt. Add the diced avocado and chopped parsley. Once zucchini is cooled, dice and add to the other ingredients. Add desired amount of olive oil and squeeze on the lemon juice. Add salt and pepper as desired to taste. I like to stir to the point the avocado JUST starts to break down and coat the other ingredients, but not so it’s completely broken down into a paste.

Jalapeño Ranch Dressing

Lauren

There will be no refunds on the future cookbook, folks. I mention this now because the first ingredient here is “store bought ranch dressing.”

This recipe is adapted from one at the country club where my husband was a bartender back in the day and ran the Martini Bar. I used to go and sit at the bar after a full nine hours working at a garden center and wait for him to get off work. I was always filthy, smelly, and sweaty and it gave me the utmost pleasure to see all the country club ladies look at me, then look at my husband, then back to me and get the most confused look on their stiff faces. What does he see in that filthy urchin and who let her in here? You’ll never know, ladies, you’ll never know. Except for the last part- I snuck in the side door. I guess I could have brought a change of clothes and some wet wipes, actually, but what’s the fun in that? Is talking about B.O .and filthy nails a good technique in a cookbook? I might have to rethink…well, everything.

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I have a salad dressing jar with a lid that I make this in, but you can make it in a large canning jar as well.

 

1.5 cups of store bought ranch dressing

¼ cup chopped cilantro

1/4 cup pickled jalapeno juice. The cans of pickled jalapenos from the ethnic section of any grocery store? Yup- that’s the stuff. Pour the juice right off the top.

 

Combine all ingredients. Shake to combine. Firmly close lid. Shake to combine.

Grown Up Fruit Salad

Lauren

This is not buffet fare. Or potluck fair. This is no salad to wither away next to some forlorn cold pasta salad. This? This is a grown up, voting aged, “Honey, we need to talk about the kids” fruit salad. Griddle pan some chicken, serve next to some rice and lentils and POW! Right in the kisser with flavor! (Wait. That’s where all food goes, actually.) Healthy and tasty as the days of summer are long. Also? A lot of chopping. A lot. So, so much. But worth it!

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“I’ll take one of everything.” (image by Andrea de Stephani)

 

1 cup spring mix

1 cup cilantro

2 medium tomatoes

½ cup red grapes

3 strawberries

½ red or yellow bell pepper

1 green apple

1 orange

½ English cucumber

1 avocado

1 lemon

½ tsp salt

 

Chop first 10 ingredients fairly finely- you want the pieces to be small enough to have at least three or four different ingredients on each forkful. Chop, chop, chop. Chop. Keep chopping…good! Mix ingredients, season with salt, squeeze lemon over the top and you’re done! Now go ice your wrist.

Sautéed Soy Sauce Shrimp

Lauren 2 Comments

Four foxes found five forks fascinating. The turtles thought tiny tremendous theories. Little ladybugs love lit lanterns. And so on. I dig me some alliteration, is what I’m trying to say.

So. About the shrimp. I buy wild caught Texas Gulf shrimp, myself. I’m not personally a fan of the frozen, bagged shrimp; but I understand how convenient those are. But it’s awfully easy to peel and devein my own, and I like supporting my beloved gulf economy, so that influences what I buy. Get one of the tools designed for cleaning them and it really is as easy as unzipping a coat. Also, get rid of the black vein running down the back. Yes that’s shrimp poop. It’s still easy to do, though, so don’t look at me like that. Author’s advice actually assists another’s acceptance of ack-inducing actions. Alliteration.

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“Psst, Buddy. How’s about I slip ya a fiver and you have chicken tonight, eh?” image by Mussaddique Naina

I serve this over rice… but they’d be awesome in lettuce wraps or for sandwiches too. Or a taco. Everything is good as a taco.

 

1 lb peeled and deveined shrimp

1 clove garlic

Small bunch chopped cilantro/ or small handful chopped green stems of scallions/green onions.

Marinade:

¼ cup orange juice

4 Tbsp. soy sauce

2 cloves garlic, crushed

3 Tbsp. apple cider vinegar

3 Tbsp. water

2 Tbsp. sesame oil

2 Tbsp. olive oil

Peel and devein your fresh shrimp (because I know I convinced you to support our local Gulf fisheries.) Add all other marinade ingredients to bowl and whisk to combine. Add shrimp and marinate for 30 minutes.

Heat 2 Tbsp. of olive oil in sauté pan over medium heat. Add chopped garlic and stir until the garlic become aromatic. Add half shrimp to pan and let sit for 45 seconds to 1 minute without touching. Flip shrimp (they should be pink and have lost their translucency.) Repeat on other side. Remove from heat to a plate and cook the second set of shrimp the same way. Why not all at once, you ask? Because that would crowd the pan and drop the heat if you added to many at once. Once all the shrimp are cooked and removed to a plate or bowl, add all of the remaining marinade to the pan, increase the heat, and simmer. Once the marinade has reached a rousing simmer (Is that a thing? I’m making that a thing) let it reduce by around half and remove from heat. Serve shrimp over rice or however you’re eating it and sparingly drizzle with cooked marinade- I say sparingly because depending on how much you reduced it, it might be quite salty thanks to the soy sauce. Taste it before serving, to be sure of flavor.

Garnish with cilantro and or chopped scallions/green onions. Or not. It’s your life.