I’m currently taking a not so great cooking class. The only upside to the class is that when we have our hands-on days our teacher doesn’t make us prepare both recipes in class, we can take our ingredients home and prepare the dish in the comfort of our own homes. Instead of making the recipe at home I take the ingredients and make something even better. This particular week I ended up with a head of fennel (is it called a head of fennel?) so I needed to devise a game plan.
I usually make a pasta with shrimp and fennel or just sautee shrimp with fennel and garlic but I wanted something different. I searched my usual internet sites and came up with this recipe from Bon Appetit. I LOVE polenta and shrimp and grits is one of my favourite foods. So I figured that shrimp and polenta would be just like shrimp and grits. What’s neat about this recipe is that the shrimp is in a cream sauce with tomatoes, fennel and of all things, preserved lemon. Luckily you don’t have to do a lengthy preservation of the lemons, it only takes an hour.
I really just used this recipe as a guide. Using 4.5 bottles of clam juice seemed excessive and that stuff isn’t that cheap. I had about half a bottle of clam juice in my fridge so I used that and used water for the rest. I wasn’t that committed to a fishy polenta. I also didn’t have any Pernod and wasn’t interested in buying any so I substituted a tiny bit (as in about 1/2 tsp or less) of Anise extract to get that extra kick of fennel taste. Trust me, ere on the side of caution with the Anise extract because that stuff is STRONG and if you use too much your dish could turn out foul. One thing to note, the directions say to add garlic but there’s no garlic in the ingredient list. I ended up using about two minced cloves.
This dish was a hit! The polenta was SO creamy. I usually just use water and some butter to make my polenta so this whole heavy cream thing really took it up a notch. My only concern was that you don’t add salt until the end so I thought it would be bland. I just made sure to season generously at the end. The shrimp portion was really fantastic. There were a lot of flavours that really worked nicely together (fennel, lemon, tomato, shrimp) and were perfectly complimented by the creamy sauce. With some garnish this could be an elegant dish for a dinner party. I also think the shrimp would go nicely with some grits or even mixed with some pasta.
Shrimp Scampi with Quick Preserved Lemon and Fennel on Polenta
Polenta:
4 1/2 8-ounce bottles clam juice
2 1/4 cups (or more) water
3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
1 1/2 cups polenta (coarse cornmeal)
3/4 teaspoon hot pepper sauce
Coarse kosher salt
Scampi:
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
12 uncooked extra-large shrimp (8 to 10 per pound), peeled, deveined, butterflied, flattened
1 cup finely chopped fresh fennel
1/2 cup finely chopped plum tomatoes
1/3 cup minced shallots
4 teaspoons chopped Quick-Preserved Lemon (recipe below)
1/4 cup Pernod or other anise-flavored liqueur
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
For polenta:
Bring clam juice, 2 1/4 cups water, and cream to boil in heavy large saucepan over medium-high heat. Gradually whisk in polenta. Reduce heat to medium-low. Simmer polenta until thick and tender, stirring constantly, 15 to 20 minutes. Add hot pepper sauce; season with salt and freshly ground pepper. Cover to keep warm (if polenta becomes firm, add 1/3 cup water and stir over low heat to loosen and rewarm).
For scampi:
Heat oil in large skillet over medium-high heat. Sprinkle shrimp on 1 side with coarse salt and pepper. Add to skillet; sear 1 minute per side. Transfer shrimp to plate. Add fennel, tomatoes, shallots, preserved lemon, and garlic. Sauté until fennel is tender, about 4 minutes. Add Pernod; boil 1 minute. Add cream; boil 1 minute. Return shrimp to skillet. Toss until just opaque in center, about 1 minute.
Spoon polenta onto plates. Top with shrimp and sauce.
Quick Preserved Lemon
1 large lemon, cut crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick rounds
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
1 tablespoon coarse sea salt
Combine all ingredients in small skillet. Bring to boil over high heat, stirring to dissolve salt. Cover; reduce heat to low. Simmer until lemon slices are almost tender (peel will look translucent), about 10 minutes. Cool. DO AHEAD: Can be made 1 week ahead. Transfer to bowl. Cover; chill.
Bon Appétit
September 2010
If you enjoyed this article, please consider sharing it!
looks wonderful! I love me some polenta and shrimp.
That sounds quite delicious.
I feel saddened for you that the cooking class isn’t going how you’d like.
Looks delicious! BTW, I think it’s called a fennel bulb 😉