Dinner Plans
Isn't it funny where inspiration comes from and how ideas come together. I was supposed to have dinner with my friend Diana tonight as she was coming to town for an Indy Photo Coach class. However, today's yucky weather prevented her from making the trek here. Glad we've already set a date for our next photo outing together.
I'm also not disappointed because when I was looking for the place to have dinner with Diana (Sahm's Tavern downtown - yum!!) I also stumbled on an ad for Wine and Canvas - already making plans to do this soon - anyone want to go?
So, with dinner plans thwarted and my legs needing to thaw out from hand shoveling the drive and sidewalks (my guy hasn't been very reliable lately) I needed to get my creative spirit in gear with some kitchen creativity tonight. Meet...Roasted Indian Shrimp...and since I'm apparently no more organized in today's post than I was in Tuesday's here is where the inspiration part comes in...
My office mates and I had a conversation about curry at lunch today. I love curry - the spice - but I've never tried to make a true "curry" that is Indian style. I had some lovely shrimp in the fridge that were begging to be used so I googled Shrimp Curry but didn't find anything less than 20 minutes in length and...I'd just shoveled the walk - I was hungry now! So, I remembered a recipe from Ina Garten (a.k.a the Barefoot Contessa) for roasted shrimp. I figured I could curry that up a bit and I was right - it was yummy!! So, in the spirit of Alisa Burke's beautiful posts (today's was Quinoa Salad which I'm going to have to try soon) here is my super simple recipe for Roasted Indian Shrimp.
Roasted Indian ShrimpPreheat the oven to 400 degrees.
You'll need about a pound of shrimp - peeled and deveined (the very sweet gentleman in the Kroger seafood area took care of all that hard work for me so I only had to peel the little lovelies - love that!)
You'll also want olive oil, kosher salt, garam masala, cumin - and then I always keep a jar of Emeril Lagasse's "Bam"
and of course, the star of the show, curry powder
Mound the shrimp in the middle of your baking sheet
Add 1 Tbsp olive oil
Add 1/2 tsp each kosher salt and garam masala. The shrimp already have a salty taste so if you're not a huge fan of salt or need to watch your salt you could easily half this. Garam Masala is one of my new favorite spices (thank you Aarti Sequiera). If you've never tried it I think it's a FABULOUS substitute for pepper. It's got much more than just pepper in it and once I use up this first jar I bought to give it a try I'm going to mix my own probably - but LOVE this stuff
Add just a tiny pinch of cumin and Bam (you could skip these two if you don't want them)
Sprinkle liberally with curry powder. I probably used 1/2 to 3/4 tsp but I didn't measure that.
Mix well. I used my hands (olive oil and spices feel wonderful on your hands - especially in winter) but you could use a spoon if you're less mess tolerant than I.
Bake for five to six minutes and...
YUM!
It was a perfect dish for a cold day and the left over fried rice I made this weekend wasn't bad with it.
I don't know about all of you, but I'm extremely glad tomorrow is Friday. Looking forward to the weekend as my mom will be here to hang out with me all weekend!