An Amuse Bouche of Shrimp for Capt. Charles Moore!

Posted by Wayne (Melbourne, Australia) on 7 February 2007 in Food & Cuisine.

An Amuse Bouche to loosely translate it is an amusement of the mouth. In terms of where it falls in the hierarchy of dishes in a meal - you can think of it as a pre-starter starter. Each guest is only meant to have one.
The primary function is to excite and whet your guest's tastebuds for the rest of the dishes to come.

But I love food too much to be bothered with just one. So I usually take a couple for myself and my guests. This recipe is meant to feed 20 with 1 serve per guest but seeing as how 1 serve is one tiny shrimp...that will simply not do under my watch...so I reckon this serves about 5-6 people tops.

I made this for my neighbour's surprise birthday party...the brief I got was that it was to be conducted in the large garden of our building complex in the evening (I used to stay in a nice complex of 3 story apartment buildings that frame a long rectangular garden with a fountain - its very pleasant and the street noises are kept out by the buildings and kids roam around in the garden on warmer days).

So I figured people are going to be roaming about and they wouldn't really have stable places to leave their plates on. I personally hate having to constantly juggle carrying my plate and glass around. I'm a very expressive person when it comes to talking...I don't exactly speaking in a loud booming voice but because I'm more of a visual person, I use my hands or whatever's near me (cups, sporks, stones) alot to help describe whatever I'm talking about. So I'm very for the idea of keeping the clutter in my plates to an absolute minimum (i.e. no bones,sauce,etc) and I thought this recipe would be a good 'fire-and-forget' type thing where people could just chuck the sticks away upon consumption and sticks are generally dry so no spills =D although they do tend to make holes in trashbags bags =(

So...as things are wont to be...they kicked off late (and the garden doesn't have floodlights) and I opened up my house (the neighbour in question actually stays in another building of the same complex and my apartment was just in front of where they were holding the party) for them to use and all that thought that went into dish planning went down the drain. But on the upside, I think she liked it (or at least didn't deny it to my face) and several other guest thought it was great albeit a tad too spicy (that was my fault - I like spicy food). My other neighbour (her housemate) felt a bit left out because she's allergic to most seafood (which I only remembered after she told me*sheepish grin*)

Anyway the whole purpose of the story was to let you know the possibilities of using this dish...not just in a fine dining sort of setting but you can have it while you're throwing a barbi or at a picnic. And also to those who haven't acquired the taste for the spicy foods...you can tone down the spices used in both the marinade and the sauce. =D Enjoy!

The recipe is as follows:
20 raw shrimp cleaned, tails removed, (You can use medium to large sized shrimp)
2 bamboo skewers 6" to 8" long, soaked in water at least one hour (You do this so that your skewers don't come out blacken...it detracts from the appearance and the carbon smoke gets into the shrimp...which also detracts from the flavor)

Marinade
(can be made ahead of time)

200 ml rice wine vinegar
50 ml fresh lime juice
200 ml extra virgin olive oil
50 ml parsley minced
25 ml sesame oil
10 drops Tabasco sauce
20 ml Kosher salt
50 ml chili paste

Dipping Sauce
(can be made ahead of time)

2/3 cup chili sauce
1/8 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon Kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly cracked black peppercorns
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
2 drops Tabasco sauce
1/4 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 garlic clove minced finely

1) Prepare the marinade; pour into a shallow dish wide enough to hold the skewers and set aside.

2) Straighten the shrimp (you can do this by making incisions into the shrimp); use one skewer for each shrimp and insert into the shrimp lengthwise. (I personally think just leaving the shrimp in its natural 'C' shape is fine and make it a nice presentation in itself...kinda like a shrimp lollipop)

3) Marinate the shrimp at least 30 minutes.

4) Prepare the dipping sauce, refrigerate until ready for use.

5) When ready to serve, grill or broil the shrimp on the skewers 1 to 2 minutes each side until pink.

6) Remove from heat and place one on each plate along with the dipping sauce and serve.

Its a 'no worries' dish to make i.e. quick and easy and quite forgiving if you don't get it exactly right.

I put up this photo because yesterday was Capt. Charles Moore's Birthday - He's Jerry's son and so it made me think of birthdays and I was wondering what photo I should put up to dedicate to Charles...which made me think of food (as do most things in life). So here it is. An Amuse Bouche for Capt. Charles Moore of the U.S Special Forces. Happy Birthday Charlie and may God keep you and watch over you as you go about serving your country!

P.s. I apologise for the not so presentable quality of my food shots...my clean up and presentation still needs alot of work (mostly because I'm more focused on eating it =p).

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