Shrimp Scampi

Seafood is quickly becoming one of my favorite things to cook.  Not only is pretty much everything still new to me and therefore a challenge, but it cooks SO fast and everything I make turns out better than expected.  I still had half a pound of shrimp leftover from when I made Beer & Lime Marinated Shrimp, so I decided to use it up the last of it on something really awesome. Shrimp Scampi is a classic shrimp dish, so I set out to find a good recipe to give my own version a try.


With the help of my never ending recipe book (also known as Google), I found a recipe that looked super easy and scaled the ingredients down a bit to fit what I needed.

First, I added the olive oil and butter to a large skillet and heated it until the butter started simmering.  I added in the salt, garlic and crushed red pepper and cooked it for 2-3 minutes, until the garlic started to brown.

After removing the shells from the shrimp as I had before, I rinsed the shrimp then added them to the skillet in a single layer. This time around I decided to cook them with the tails on--from what I've read and heard, cooking the tails and shells with butter makes a shrimp butter, so then cooking the dish with the tails on logically would have the same effect.  More flavor is always good!  Next, I added the wine (I used a Chardonnay that I had on hand) and increased the heat to high.  I cooked one side for about 2 minutes then flipped them to cook the other side.  Finally, I mixed in the oregano and lemon juice.  I swapped out the parsley from the original recipe for oregano because I had JUST used up the last of my parsley the day before.  Sometimes, you just have to compromise!

I cooked some pasta to go with it, tossing it in some melted butter and lemon juice.

The shrimp was delicious!  It had a nice bit of spice and was amazing with the pasta.  I normally don't order shrimp at restaurants in preference of chicken, but this dish sways me even more in the seafood direction.  I will absolutely make this again & will definitely try more shrimp scampi in the future!

Shrimp Scampi Recipe

Ingredients:

1/2 pound shrimp
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper
1/4 cup white wine
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 teaspoons oregano

Instructions:

Heat a skillet to medium-high; add olive oil and butter.  Once the butter bubbles, add the garlic and crushed red pepper. If using unsalted butter, sprinkle with salt. Sauté for about one minute, until the garlic begins to brown, then add the shrimp to the pan in one even layer.  Add the white wine and stir to combine.  Increase the heat to high and let the wine boil for 2-3 minutes.  Flip the shrimp over and boil for another minute. Remove from the heat, add the oregano and lemon juice and stir.  Serve over pasta or rice.