Sunday, December 16, 2012

Shrimp

Note the vanilla soy milk carton. Now notice that it has "Large Shrimp 10-10-12" handwritten on the front. In my family, it is a sin to buy shrimp from the store. Complete and utter sacrilege. I've been eating my shrimp out of random containers (mostly old orange juice cartons) since I was a kid. I never knew any different. Now I realize how cool it is that my grandfather, Bob, has always caught our shrimp for us. The freezer is always loaded down with his catch. I remember him teaching me how to throw a cast net in the yard when I was about eight. Hold it in your teeth between the weights, get your stance, and....cast! I gradually moved on from casting into the grass to actually throwing the cast net off the bow of the boat. I may have caught a handful of shrimp every now and then but he would always bring in loads of them. They would get all caught up in the net and he'd empty it out. I'd watch them plop onto the bottom of the boat and jump around. Every time I tried to pick them up they'd poke a hole in my hands with their sharp little points, but it never seemed to phase Bob. He'd scoop them up by the handful and throw them into the live bait well.

So yeah, it takes a little extra effort. You have to peel them yourself, but that's all part of the fun. Makes them taste better in the end knowing that your own sweat, blood, and tears (mostly just sweat and blood) went into to bringing those shrimp home for dinner.


In case you're interested, here's was the most recent recipe I made with Bob's shrimp. Click the link below.

Cilantro Lime Shrimp


-Caroline



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