Thanks for the Crepes

I wish I had made them, but sadly, I am yeast bread challenged. Fortunately, I can purchase most excellent ones made by magic bakers! It is not like a pita because it doesn't naturally separate on its own. It's a yeast bread and the version I can buy comes from my mediterranean store or Baghdad Bakery where they are baked. Almost every single post in this Yelp link mentions how good the Samoon bread is here. I'm lucky that these places are so close to my home that I can walk to them both. Have I ever mentioned how lucky I was to live in such a diverse food community? Now to get my husband on board with more of it ... Baghdad's version is made only with flour, water, salt and yeast with sesame seeds on top. You must take a knife and carefully cut a pocket to stuff it with sandwich fillings. Oh, and for those who dis Yelp, I found these and many more gems in my community right on Yelp. At least in a smaller (150,000 souls) city, Yelp definitely works. I even "know" frequent posters whose tastes are similar to mine. It might not be as effective in NY or LA, but I love it for my purposes. Here's a very short wiki link, a YouTube link that shows Iraqis Making Samoon bread in a stone oven (no sound) and another YouTube link that shows someone making the delicious bread at home. Now you know every bit as much as I do about Samoon bread. I would not call the Samoon I can get flaky at all. There's no fat in the recipe. What I would not give to have that kind of skill with flour, water, salt and yeast!

We had a break in a week and a half of pretty much constant rainy weather we've had for a week and a half. I was able to cook the El Pollo Loco knock off chicken outdoors over charcoal. This recipe is a keeper, and thanks so much to @mgaretz for jogging my decades old memory of this dish and sharing the marinade recipe. I did use cayenne and a fresh minced jalapeno with seeds and all instead of sriracha, but otherwise followed the recipe to the letter including the yellow food coloring. I used McCormick, and I've always had a problem with the yellow not being very effective. It was no different here, and the color wasn't very strong and only skin deep. I would up the chili content next time, because while the chicken had great flavor, the heat did not even register. I loved the way the chicken seemed to retain moisture better after its overnight bath. After I'd already put the chicken to marinate, I did a little more reading about the dish, and came upon for suggestions for turmeric or annatto for the yellow color. Annatto would probably be more authentic, but I do not think the flavor of turmeric would go astray, and I have used that with chicken to good effect in the past too. I also ran across this old post on our very own site from member @Jaymes that shares a very similar recipe that uses fresh chili like I did. Chicken is something that requires pretty constant attention when grilling on my set up. In order to spend time outside with it, I just nuked some baking potatoes and served with butter and sour cream as a side. I also had sliced tomato, and grilled tortillas. I had used a can of pineapple rings packed in pineapple juice. I used the juice for the marinade and grilled the rings as a side/dessert. I'll serve the leftovers with the more traditional beans and things. One thing I noted is that this recipe took longer than usual when I take the chicken out of the fridge and wash it. The washing takes the fridge chill off and brings the temp up significantly. Next time, I'll take the chicken out of the fridge earlier. Great recipe! Inexpensive, pretty easy and very tasty.

Your cake looks like it came out great, Norm. I too would be suspicious of a recipe for cake with no moisture except from the eggs and butter as well. I'm not a good enough baker to offer a qualified opinion, but it might interest you that I watched Lidia Bastianich prepare a similar cake on PBS today. She attributed the recipe to her grandmother, so perhaps not much altering going on with it? Here's a link to her grandma's recipe.

We had the large mango I got from the fish store tonight. It was sweet, and so juicy that when I was scraping the pit with my teeth for the last bits of flesh over the kitchen sink, the juice was running down my elbows. My husband liked it better than the ones we usually get from the grocery store. I think it was a fine mango too, but I think I prefer the tarter flavor and the more pronounced notes of pine that I adore from the grocery store ones. I fried up some maduros from a Guatemalan Dole plantain that I had let turn completely black skinned. The main course was the last of that hickory smoked ham steak and provolone cheese stuffed into Samoon bread split into a pocket. I wrapped each one after spitting and stuffing in sealed foil and heated in the 400 F/204 C oven for fifteen minutes. I had taken the ham out earlier so it wouldn't be going into the sandwich cold from the fridge. The idea came from this photo when I was looking up more info on Samoon bread. Our sandwiches were pretty flat compared to the overstuffed one in the photo. I was thinking of putting an egg in each sandwich as well, but it would have been overkill. They were perfect just as they were. These would be great stuffed with everything from falafel to egg salad to fried seafood to ... A bonus of using the bread in a familiar dish was that my husband is just as sold on this bread now as I am, so may not be as resistant to taking me to the mediterranean store. It should be easier now to get more crack bread. After dinner I mixed up this marinade, kindly shared by member, mgaretz. I'm marinating a whole chicken in it in a burrito tortilla bag, which is the only thing I had large enough, inside of a stainless bowl in the fridge. I thought I had one of those huge zip bags king crab legs and other seafood comes in, but I guess I'm out. I hope it doesn't rain tomorrow, as it has done every day for over a week, so I can cook over charcoal tomorrow, but the chix will be cooked one way or another. Tropical storm/hurricane season is a pain here even when it doesn't get outright violent. I have been remembering eating at El Pollo Loco, where this recipe comes from. Ours left town about thirty years ago, but I still remember the experience. It wasn't a fancy place, and specialized really in one thing they did really well: the chicken. They had several sides and they were fine, but I can't recall any being exceptional or memorable. You smelled the chicken cooking as soon as you opened the door, and then you saw it cooking on huge on grates over open gas flames on huge grills. I am looking forward to this a lot, and if I get rained out tomorrow and have to roast the chicken in the oven, I expect it will still be delicious, but this is going to happen over charcoal one day.

I made a quiche out of the leftover hickory smoked ham steak, cheddar, a small piece of mozzarella I needed to use, spinach and a little finely minced white onion. I spiced the custard (2% milk) with a little ground clove, black pepper and cayenne. We had a few halved and seeded muscadine grapes on the side. I preceded this with a Greek salad of sorts. I had picked up some more French Valbreso sheep's milk feta from the mediterranean store. I know I said I did not endorse it anymore because the last batch was so gamy to me. It had been my favorite for so long, I gave it another shot, and this batch is fine. I like to serve this on whole Romaine leaves with the cheese crumbled down the central spine of the leaf. I also put tomato, cucumber and whole mushrooms on my plate. I pick up the whole leaf roll it around the cheese, and eat it out of hand. My husband was tearing his into bits, and making a mess. During the eating, I had an idea. On the last leaf, I rolled the end toward the core as usual almost to the halfway point. Then I folded the top and more flexible half of the leaf down over the top of the roll at the other end, leaving enough of the tip of the leaf to fold down over the end where the leaf was torn off the core. Then I rolled the sides of the leaf over that, and voila, a lettuce wrap with feta filling that is completely enclosed, looks like a green eggroll, and can be eaten easily and neatly! Next time I make these, I'm sneaking some other veggies into the filling of my husband's too, and I think he will eat and enjoy his green "eggrolls". When I asked him if he wanted the additional veggies he said no, so I told him that it would be healthier for him. He said he thought the feta was healthy, and asked for Ranch dressing with it. After rolling my eyes, still facing my kitchen task, I turned to him and I informed him that feta is a cheese and therefore high in saturated fat, cholesterol and calories. I ignored the request for Ranch, and after he started eating, he agreed that it didn't need it. He has a stent, so I have to go into stealth veggie mode frequently. I think this "eggroll" idea will work like a charm. Edit: I totally forgot about the Samoon bread that I served with the Greek salad. We split one of the small loaves that I had wrapped in foil and heated in the oven for about 10 minutes or so while the quiche baked. I thought they were pide because of the Turkish pideler served at Bosphorus restaurant here, but I was wrong. They come from Baghdad Bakery, but are resold for a small markup at my Mediterranean store. I think the guy that owns the store might be from Iraq, because years ago, he was always tuned to a radio station that covered the war closely whenever I shopped there.

Can you believe we have a Himilayan restaurant with a Yelp 4-1/2 star rating in our little community of 150,000 souls. This report has made me even more determined to get there somehow. Your lunches look so good! It doesn't look good because when I suggested another Indian restaurant the other day the first word out of my husband's mouth, was "Urghyuckh"! I don't know how to spell "yuck" pronounced guttarally, like a kid would, but that's what I heard, roughly. I asked why, and he said, "Indian food sucks!" I responded that there is a learning curve for people not used to it. He was having none of it. It's over a four mile round trip to walk to by myself for lunch, so that's out too. It is especially out because I can't pass a grocery store without picking up stuff, and it's never one item. Over two miles with a load is too long a hike for this old pack mule, and there's a supermarket in the same strip mall. Maybe if I research the menu more, find less challenging and less spicy dishes, and show him some photos, I can talk him into it. I am nothing if not resourceful. This will happen someday.

Kay, I could just about live on beans and cornbread too, and that memory of the fresh picked purple hulls is very old and very cherished. I was so disappointed. I screwed up every single dish in the dinner that night, and most of it was my fault. I haven't thrown out the other half of the package and will report back when I cook it. Whenever I hear this song, I always thinks that modern day prisoners would be glad to be fed well-prepared cornbread and beans. I know I would anytime. I recently bought and cooked some Pict Sweet speckled butter beans, and they were just about perfect. It was probably the evil cold I'm still trying to shake/kitchen spirits when I tried to cook the purple hulls. I will try again. I will also go back for some Pict Sweet fresh frozen crowders and more butter beans.

Arey, you hit my funnybone again. Lots of folks hate limas. I'm glad my husband loved them as I do.

Great to see you blogging about hunting season! One thing i have found that I like made from pumpkin is a custard. If you froze the puree, you could pull it out for soups if you wanted, pies or custards. I haven't found a soup that I really like. Most have chicken broth, and that's not a good combo, for me. I can tell from some of the small servings you plate that you are concerned with calories. Pies are quite calorie dense, with the flour and fat from the crust. You can make a custard with 2% milk, eggs, reduced sugar and spices you like without a crust. It can be served as a desert or makes a good side to pork or chicken. It can be made pretty light. Just a thought. They make such great fall decorations, and I love your wagon full of pumpkins too! That's a lotta punkins and putting them out to reseed themselves is a good idea. I wouldn't be surprised if the raccoons scavenged them too. Anything I put out like carrot peels or sweet potato skins or winter squash peels get scarfed up post haste. I don't know if they are going after the Vitamin A or not, but they do love that stuff. I only put scraps out during full daylight now since my playful attack by one of the young ones.

We had part of a thick hickory smoked ham steak with over easy eggs, muscadines, 1 homemade blueberry pancake each from the freezer and one slice of toast to sop up the egg yolk. I was going to make biscuits, but as the latest development in my summer long battle with the landlord, they asked me to cut off the air conditioning, until tomorrow to dry out the condensation backup so they can try applying a sealant. This won't work either, but I'm complying for now, so no oven tonight. I missed the biscuits, and if they don't show up tomorrow before it gets really hot again, the air is going back on. The rest of the ham steak is probably going to end up in a quiche later.

I made spaghetti and sliced kielbasa cooked in the same pasta pot. In a 10"/25 cm skillet, I sauteed a huge crushed clove of garlic slowly in 3T butter meanwhile. I had also peeled and chopped the stem from a broccoli crown and cut the florets into small pieces. The stems were added right to the pasta boiling pot in the last five minutes of cooking, and the florets went in a minute later. I added pasta cooking water, a little crushed red pepper, and a little Knorr Caldo de Pollo chicken bouillon powder to the garlic butter. I added a bunch more crushed pepper to my portion and some grated Parm to the plated dishes, including the portion I reserved for my husband's lunch tomorrow. This was served only with a side of North Carolina muscadine grapes that were halved and seeded before plating. He did mention the tough skins, but I love that about these grapes. Such flavor, that can't be approached with a more mainstream variety! This time, be both ate everything on our plates. I plated most of the sausage on my husband's dinner and lunch plates, because he likes it a lot better than I do. I like the broccoli/garlic butter spaghetti without it, but did not dare serve a meatless dinner tonight after last night's FUBAR meal. He brought home his empty containers today, and either he ate them or he dumped them. I don't wish to know. I could not have done a repeat, but you have to do certain things in order to tolerate each other for 17 years, I have found. Anyway, I'm sure he'll be genuinely happy with his lunch tomorrow. Hopefully, the evil kitchen spirits that plagued me yesterday have moved on.

Lots of places have market price for lobster or catch of the day. That is very different than being handed a menu with no pricing at all. Apparently I've not been privy to the exclusive clubs that still practice this. I have never in my life been handed a menu in a restaurant with no pricing at all, and I'm 57 and female. It would make me most uncomfortable, and had I known beforehand, I'd have avoided the experience. My mom taught me before she passed when I was only eight years old that, "A lady always orders from the middle-priced items of the menu." It must have been a priority with her, since I wasn't exactly on the dating circuit then. Or maybe she was trying to curb my early curiosity about the culinary world on our rare ventures into restaurants? One of my pet peeves is no pricing on online menus or being asked to create an account with e-mail address, and other personal info in order to get more info, and at that point, one has no idea what that further info might even be. Even some fast food and delivery places are now asking for this. McDonald's does not even offer pricing except for their specials like McPick 2 for $5, which is currently running. Local chain pizza places are asking for your life story now, before even offering up a menu, much less pricing. I always go for Primo Pizza, a mom and pop place with the best pizza and tiramisu in town, if they have the dessert. They have a great antipasto salad as well. They don't even store your address or phone number, but I'd rather give it again when ordering than be bombarded with spam. Their prices are posted online for everyone to see. This no-pricing thing seems to be a minority, but considering the huge influence of giants like McD's it is scary to me. Anyone who asks for personal info before displaying their menu gets clicked off! Don't even get me started on the hoity-toity restaurants, that granted, I probably can't afford to eat at anyway, but don't offer pricing online even if you are seriously interested, and were willing to offer up your first born.

Fresh frozen purple hull peas are mealy, and don't live up to my memory of 41 years ago of picking pods in a field, bringing them home, shelling, cooking and eating them on the same day. Perhaps the memory is faulty on the variety (perhaps they were crowders, another similar-looking relative of the more common black eye)? I believe I saw some crowders in the freezer case last time, so these are on my grocery list. Or perhaps there's just no substitute for freshly harvested and cooked shelly beans? This is what my grandma called them. I do like the traditional three bean salad, although, fresh wax beans are not available here commercially, to my knowledge. I did find a bag of frozen at Trader Joes one time. These were an improvement over the canned, which are very hard to find here too. Unless you grow them yourself or know a generous person that does, you're generally out of luck on the fresh variety. I used to grow them, and three bean salad was my favorite way to serve them. This salad even tastes good several days later, but the olive drab color the acid from the vinegar component inflicts on the bright green beans is off-putting. There's information on eG that boiling the green beans with baking soda will preserve their bright color at least long enough to offer the salad at a family and friends potluck or church buffet. I intend to try it. My go to recipe just has green and yellow wax beans with red kidney beans for the bean component. There are many variations.

mgaretz, we had one of these at Maynard and Kildaire Farm Roads for a few years. Many years ago, the Los Tres Magueyes Mexican Restaurant took over the site. I have no idea why El Pollo closed, because I thought they were great, and got many work lunches from there. I remember when they installed the large gas line to the place for El Pollo Loco. It was pretty disruptive because that area has been developed at saturation for years, (at least for our mostly one story community) and they accidentally cut some other utility lines. There are none of the restaurants in the area now. I would love your recipe details, although I'll be cooking the chix over charcoal, but I don't think that will hurt it at all.

It is a very cute mold, but I did wonder, "Now how is she going to get the spaceman with his 'nipped in waist of a neck' out of a solid mold. It looks like the rockets would come out easier because they are all tapered at the bottom of the molds. If the mold were in two pieces with a seal somehow devised, the shapes would be endless. I'm willing to bet that your pineapple, coconut and calamansi creation was very delicious. Do you have a tree that is hardy in your area, or did you purchase the calamansi? I never see any around here.

Okay, I have now watched Season 4, Episodes 1 and 2. They are named "Onions and Avetts" and "My Watermelon Baby" respectively. I still love the series. I didn't realize a new season has come out, because by the time I get a chance to watch on broadcast PBS, late at night, the episode has already aired during the daytime and is no longer marked new. It's just easier to watch them whenever it's convenient here at this free link. She offers up some recipes here too. I PBS. Southern people are very friendly, and known for their hospitality, but have a straightforward, honest way of communicating that might put people who aren't used to that off. Personally, I like the lady's personality. You always know exactly where you stand with most of us Southerners. No inscrutability here. Her humbleness comes out frequently when she is just as open about self-doubt. Her restaurant, The Chef and the Farmer, still has a 4-1/2 star rating out of five on Yelp. It's got many five star reviews from folks who have traveled a long way to eat there. It's a destination restaurant. Sure, it's expensive for the kind of fare offered, and they get a few one star reviews, and most of the complaints are about the value/pricing. I still recommend the series, but YMMV.

Well, I had dinner, but it is a sad tale. Everything on the plate was pretty bad, and worse, I was completely responsible for this gustatory failure. My husband did not excoriate anything, nor did he praise it, as he usually does. He did not eat more than a few forkfuls. I was similarly disappointed, but I choked mine down because I was hungry. I served the leftover salt and pepper shrimp, and as I had been warned, it loses its crispness if not eaten quickly. I ate a couple of heads and tails and most of the legs, and peeled the bodies and ate those. My husband ate one, but spit most of it out. Peeling his own shrimp is just not something he's interested in doing. They were so good the first time fresh cooked, but this dish does not lend itself to leftovers. I had a stash of purple hull peas in the freezer that I had been anticipating since I bought them. They were frozen from fresh. They were the mealiest pulses I believe I've ever eaten. I made a salad with lemon tahini dressing, green bell pepper, grated carrot, iceberg lettuce, peeled store bought cucumber and a garden tomato. It was a waste of the garden tomato, that was very good when I chomped on the stem core and a wedge I snitched while preparing the salad. The dressing was fine when I tasted it for seasoning, but the finished dish sucked hard. I really don't know what happened, but I think I prefer a leaf lettuce with lemon tahini dressing. It doesn't help that my husband brought home a nasty respiratory infection that is messing with our taste, smell and ability to even draw breath. Yeah, I'm sick. That's my lame excuse, but I think this is one of the worst meals I have ever had, where every single dish was really, really bad. I also made a creamy herb sauced angel hair pasta. I later figured out why it was sticking together so badly. I forgot to add the butter! I have made this dish a hundred times or more. Bless his heart, my husband requested the leftovers for lunch. I knew he wouldn't eat the shrimp, so I gave him the purple hull peas and some of the pasta with his container of cantaloupe he did not eat yesterday in favor of the catfish sandwich I also sent. Every thing else went down the garbage disposal. I almost never do that, but I could not face this terrible food again. If my husband is smart, he will ditch the food in the construction dumpster, except the cantaloupe, get one of his guys to bring him takeout, and bring the container home pretending he ate it. Well tomorrow is another day. I am sure dinner will be better then. Well I sure hope so anyway.

More power to ya, @Lisa Shock! I am still going to do this from my bookmarked recipe, but haven't got 'round to it yet. I have been playing with other interesting stuff and pumping out required meals for my husband. This is going to happen eventually in the kitchen of TftC. You are inspiring me! Chicken takes a lot of salt, and perhaps good homemade onion rings maybe not so much. I made salt and pepper shrimp tonight and was a little astonished at how much salt it called for, but it was excellent, if not the healthiest dish I've made.

Can't hardly wait, @sartoric!

My floors are not level at all, influencing my oven. I live in an older house, only from the 1970's but not particularly well built or maintained, thanks to the land lord. Cakes are, well... interesting. I've quit trying to make layer cakes, because even if you turn the layers thick to thin side it really doesn't result in an acceptably level cake. I also fight with my microwave door, because it wont stay open due to the swayed floor and gravity. When I am putting a hot casserole back into the nuker, where I need both potholdered hands, I will let the door fall into my head to hold it open. Gotta watch out for the sharp latch hitting you in the eye! Bundt cakes work best for me because I can always cut off the higher side of the cake, flip it, and glaze it and it looks normal. The cut off portion is, of course, quality control/cook's treat. I have a decorative bakers rake in the dining room. No casters, although they would probably work with my sway backed house if they locked. I intended to use it for a bakers rack, but since I just about live in my kitchen, personal belongings end up there instead along with decorative stuff on the top one of the four shelves. It's right next to my chair in the dining area of the kitchen. Everything ends up there, and I need to give it good sorting, as is usual. I just love shelves and wish I had room for a lot more. I don't know how I would feed about the industrial-looking kitchen shelves linked to here, because my kitchen is very large, attached to a dining area which doubles as our living room. The big TV is in there, and that's where we spend most of our time. I especially love the wall-mounted wire shelves mounted above the washer and dryer. They are indispensable to me. I keep detergent, dryer sheets, rags for cleaning and old rugs for the cats up there. They also hold coolers for what used to be boat camping trips and now they are mostly used for extended power outages for hurricanes or ice storms. I agree with the opinions about wanting casters in a more production-focused kitchen, though. My bakers rake has a leaf and vine pattern painted in textured black that just feels like it might melt if I put a hot pan on it. I don't know, because soon after I bought it, all my stuff, including my purse started migrating there. I have bookshelves and pantry shelves that go nearly to the 8'/2.44 meters ceiling. Living here would not be nearly as comfortable without them. No castors, but I am just a home cook who pretty much lives in her kitchen when I'm not sleeping or out, which a rare occurrence. The bakers rack is very light once my stuff is unloaded from it. I am certain I would give it a thorough cleaning underneath more often if it was on rollers, though. The book/pantry shelves are very heavy and I suspect they're made of press/particle board laminated with some kind of thick white vinyl or other plastic. It's okay though, because they are flush with the floor and nothing can get under them. My husband took these off a job site (with permission, of course) he was working, else they went into the construction dumpster. You would not believe what some rich people/companies trash. I also backed four of the bookshelves with some wooden slats that are laminated onto heavy canvas fabric much like a roll top desk has. There's also a piece cut to fit one of the black-painted shelves on the bakers rack that I use the most. This roll top desk material was also salvaged off a job site. I think it's oak, but I can't swear to that.

Yum @sartoric! I'll be over right away. Well maybe not as you're a world away from me, but I will enjoy it vicariously. More details please? I looked these things up when you mentioned them on the Breakfast thread. They seem to be huge beasts. Are you having a lot of guests over to help eat your bounty? We only get much smaller crabs from local waters, and thanks to government regs, they are almost always pre-boiled and quite dead. We do get frozen king crab legs from Alaska, which are even huger than your mud/mangrove crabs, but they are never sold with their bodies in these parts. Is there any good eating in the bodies? The exception is much smaller softshell crabs which are usually only available in restaurants, and I have never had any that I liked. Too chitininous for me, because you are supposed to eat the nascent shells along with the flesh of the fried whole crabs. Maybe I just haven't been to the right restaurant. These are the crabs that are seasonally molting out of their hard shells so they can grow bigger in a new one. We do get live lobsters here and some Asian groceries sell live fish from their tanks, but no shrimp, alas. Quality can vary according to how long they have been kept in the tanks living in their own waste. I had some bad lobster once from our largest Asian store that just tasted muddy and not bright and delicious like lobsters should. It did not make me sick, thank God, but it tasted pretty bad.

I'm yeast bread challenged, but even I have had good luck with frozen pizza dough. Pizza is one of my favorite foods so I was determined to make a good dough. I spent years tweaking and making notes, and then found this recipe. I liked it better than my own so that's what I make now. I like a really thin crust, so I take half the dough, spread it on a steel cookie sheet, and use that the first night and freeze the second half. Oh, and I do not use the semolina flour or the pizza dough flavor, both of which are optional. The beer really ups the good yeasty flavor. When I'm ready for another pizza, I take the dough ball out of the freezer and place it in a greased bowl turning it over to grease the entire ball and cover the bowl with plastic wrap or one of those bowl covers that looks like a hotel shower cap. It thaws overnight and all day the next day. Then I take it out and set it on the counter to come to room temp. I typically find this takes about 3 hours or so depending on the temp of the kitchen. The only time I've ever had pizza dough fail completely was when I bought a dough ball from the refrigerated case from Trader Joes. It did not rise and ruined pizza night. You can also keep pizza dough in the fridge for four or five days, but my husband doesn't like it as much as I do and will complain if I serve it too often. The freezer works better for our situation. The flavor actually improves during fridge storage, though.

Hmmm. No, I haven't watched anything from the new season yet, but I love the series. Thanks for the heads up. I hope I won't be too disappointed.

It was easy to get my husband fed tonight as he had a leftover catfish fillet. I baked some frozen onion rings and reheated the filet for the last 12 minutes. He also had some cantaloupe. Then it was time for the fun part. I made salt and pepper shrimp from this recipe with a couple ideas borrowed from this recipe from the epicurious site. I used only enough oil to come a bit over halfway up the shrimp and flipped them over to cook the other side, and I used salt and pepper seasoned cornstarch to dredge the shrimp before cooking. I also did not have cilantro, but did have flat leaf parsley so that's what I used. I'm sure it would have been even more delicious with cilantro, but these were GOOD! The heads, legs and tails just shattered in my mouth, so it more a case of crunching up the entire head rather than sucking anything out of them. If you do make this with head on shrimp, make sure you do not skip the instruction to snip off the horns and antennae. This is pretty easy with a pair of kitchen scissors, but it is critical. Those suckers are sharp! I found the shells from the body section were not crisp enough to crunch up enough, so I started peeling off that parted after devouring the heads, legs and tails. Next time I might peel the bodies first, as they were harder to shell after frying than raw shrimp is. Hmmph. That would mean losing the legs, which were one of the best parts, so maybe not. I had exactly one pound of shrimp, and there were twenty-six of them. One time when we brought back head on shrimp from New Orleans, I weighed them before and after beheaded and shelling, and the shelled shrimp was only half of the before weight. While 26 per pound sounds like largish medium shrimp, when you are talking about headless ones, I think these were sufficiently small for the recipe. I also fried the last two cremini mushrooms and one of the green tomatoes and had some cantaloupe. I was only able to eat a little less than half the shrimp, so I hope they will be good tomorrow. An entire roll of Dollar Store paper towels bravely gave their lives in the preparation of this dinner between blotting the shrimp dry before dredging and then blotting the oil from the finished fried food. Edit: I forgot to add that since I was using less oil in a deep 12"/30 cm skillet, I split the shrimp in two batches to keep from dropping the oil temp, as suggested in the epicurious method.

The smaller, the better, IMO. I wish I could find the smaller variety around here more frequently. When I do, I glom onto them. They are the very best for serving in their shells with a white clam sauce with pasta and for clams casino.