The Fresh Market in Savannah has a special going for the month of February: $6 Saturdays!
You can get a pound of Floriday Gulf shrimp or lobster tails for $6 each!
Woohoo! G and I bought some of both.
I was really craving spicy Jamaican hot pepper shrimp, especially since it has been cold lately. Yes, 40 degrees is cold in Savannah!
I got this awesome recipe from a neighbor:
But G was in the mood for pasta. And since shrimp and pasta are perfect together, I came up with a recipe that really knocked our socks off!
Warning: this dish is SPICY! Adjust the amount of hot peppers if you need to.
First, I put the shrimp bath on, and started a pot of water to boil for the pasta.
When the shrimp bath was ready, I tossed in a handful of okra in along with the shrimp. (I had the okra left over from the Gumbo-laya I made for Mardi Gras.)
I took the shrimp out after a minute so they wouldn’t get hard, and let the okra cook for a bit. Then I put it in a bowl with the shrimp, adding all the lovely goodies from the water (except for the whole allspice). In the same pan, I drizzled some olive oil and added a tablespoon of butter. When it was hot, I threw in a couple of minced garlic cloves and a handful of cherry tomatoes I’d halved. I let them sizzle over medium-low heat while the pasta finished cooking, then I added the shrimp and okra to the pot to mix it all in. After draining the pasta I threw that in, too.
G grated a boatload of Parmesan cheese with the fancy new grater we bought at Williams Sonoma yesterday. We eat a LOT of Parmesan cheese, so it was a worthwhile investment.
This is what the finished dish looked like:
It was AMAZING. The allspice gives the dish an interesting twist. We had a baguette to go with it, which was good because we needed something to absorb some of the heat of the habaneros! (Did you see that habanero peeking out at the top of my bowl?)
The wine G chose was the perfect pairing as well. I know some people prefer white wine with seafood. Conundrum would go well with this dish, but we prefer red wine so we had a light Italian which went beautifully. Here’s what we drank:
A 2007 Seccal Valpolcella Ripasso. It was fruity and well-rounded, but not too full-bodied. A great wine for about $19.
If you try this dish, do come back and tell me what you think!
What the Focus 