Food Goes In Mouth

Freshman year. The dorms. As was common during a midnight session of programming, the television is on and tuned to whatever the hell is good at that hour. Often enough, this was episodes of the original Japanese version of Iron Chef.

Saito is challenging Kenichi in Battle Prawns and both of them include variations on the same dish. Both of them are fairly simple, as far as Iron Chef concoctions go. Chef Kenichi ends up making what was later called out to be one of the five best dishes on the show, Prawns in Chili Sauce Canapé Style. I was enthralled with the simplicity and the reaction it induced.

During one of my next visits home, as is now seemingly customary, I cooked something for my family. (I especially got a kick out of this at the time, both because I was new to cooking and they had never seen me do it before.) I remembered the recipe I had seen on TV. I knew I couldn’t reproduce it; I had no chance of finding spicy bean paste or the prawns he had used. But I could find some sort of seafood, something spicy, and make some ill-thought-out substitutions. The resultant shrimp and scallop spicy thingamajig (with the appropriate finishing, almost off-the-heat toss of green onion) was something along the lines of my first success. My mom wanted me to make it again.

I’ve since played around with the ingredients, timing, heat, and anything else under my immediate control so much that the “recipe” doesn’t even resemble the original masterpiece. What I’ve produced below resembles other dishes entirely. I plan to continue exploring and changing things, keeping what I think works and throwing the crap I think stinks to the gutter, until I find something I can feel comfortable calling original and delicious.

This latest incarnation took some inspiration from the Shrimp with Snow Peas recipe at Rasa Malaysia. When I saw the picture last month I knew the snow peas would add a nice fresh crunch the spice from the sauce needed. All I needed was an occasion to cook it up. A few weeks ago this happened.

What I Used

• Large Shrimp, peeled, removed of vein and tail
• Chinese Peas
• Orange Zest
• Fresh Ginger, grated
• Sriracha
• Dried Red Chili Peppers, whole
• Peanut or Canola Oil
• Salt

What I Did

1. Heat oil in wok (or whatever other pan you favor stir-frying in.)
2. Fry the dried chilies in the oil for a minute, then remove them.
3. Add ginger, orange zest, salt, and fry until fragrant (~30 seconds.)
4. Add Sriracha, shrimp, and toss/stir until shrimp is almost cooked through (3-4 minutes)
5. Add Chinese peas and continue cooking for 1-2 minutes longer while stirring. The peas should heat up and start to soften slightly, but retain all that awesome crunch.

When adding the dried chilies turn the fan on high. Even then, when the aroma begins to make you cough, and possibly everyone else in the house cough, you’re good. Get em’ out of there. Before I learned of this potential I once heated these things for several minutes dry and then added liquid. The rapidly created, violent aroma kept me and my grandma from reentering her house for at least 10 minutes while it aired out.

While removing all the flavorful peel from the shrimp isn’t something I’d normally do, this way the spicy sauce will adhere to the shrimp and not be lost on the peel while you’re noming away. Plus, you wont get your hands all dirty and spicy. You then wont rub your eyes with your spicy fingers. This severely lowers the chances you’ll want to gouge your eyes out or pour milk in them.

Ok, wow, I feel like I’ve written a lot. Too much. If anybody has some suggestions on where to go on this thing from here, I’d love to hear it in the comments.