Caveman Sam

I dig shrimp. I lived for 5 years just off  the coast of South Carolina and I learned to love these delicious little protein nuggets of the sea. There will likely be lots of recipes in the future that include shrimp. This one got mixed reviews. The Cavewife was not a big fan. The Cavekids were OK with it. The Cavebrother wouldn’t stop eating it. I was going to call this Penang Kung, or Penang Shrimp Curry, because it’s based on this recipe at Closet Cooking but I didn’t use any Penang curry paste. I used a ground spice blend that was fantastic but doesn’t count as Penang.

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 a can of coconut milk
• 1/2 can of bamboo shoots
• 1/2 can of water chestnuts
• 1/2  lime (juice)
• 1 pound shrimp, peeled and deviened
• 1/4  red pepper, sliced
• 1 handful peas
• 1 handful cilantro
• 1/4 cup pineapple, chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 inch fresh ginger, peeled and minced

Spice blend:

• 1 teaspoon curry powder
• 1 teaspoon coriander
• 1/2 teaspoon cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon
  turmeric
• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• 8 allspice seeds (or unripe berries apparently)

Directions:

1) Grind the spices all together. Or just mix them together if you don’t need to do any grinding. My coriander and allspice needed it. Add the olive oil to a skillet, heat it up and then add the spice blend, garlic and ginger. Cook for about a minute.

2) Add the coconut milk, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts and lime juice. Simmer for 10-15 minutes.

3) Add shrimp, red pepper, pineapple and peas. Cook for another 5 minutes.

4) Serve garnished with cilantro.

I got a mortar and pestleefor Christmas from the Cavewife. It’s fun to use. This spice blend smelled fantastic.

I only used half of the cans of bamboo shoots, water chestnuts and coconut milk. I’ll use the other halves to make something else deliciously Thai later this week.

The turmeric will give the dish a rich yellow color.

I usually use raw shrimp but I had these already cooked shrimp in the freezer from months ago that needed to be used. Luckily they weren’t freezer burned.

Ours turned out pretty spicy.

The Cavebrother liked the sauce. A lot.

Notice the three plates. He ate his, the rest of the Caveboy’s and the Cavewife’s. And licked those plates too. :)