Brook's Thai Ginger Shrimp

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Brook (HistoricFoodie) and I do a lot of brainstorming via email. Not long ago, he wrote to me about some "radish wraps" that he had discovered, and opined that they would be perfect with this dish. 

Sure enough - not long after that, he sent this:

 The radish wraps worked out great. I filled them with ginger shrimp, as planned, a few bean sprouts, and, in my wife's case, some shredded snow peas. We’re talking about a perfect snack food, or even a main dish. They would also be great served with noodles.

Here’s the recipe I used. For my wife's sake I left out the chili altogether, but it’s tasty enough with just the Thai sweet chili sauce. You might also want to cut the chili sauce in half, or scrape most of the finished sauce off her shrimps, in order to remain married.

 THAI GINGER SHRIMP

2 lbs shrimp, peeled & deveined        
2 tbsp Sherry
1/4 tsp salt                                            
2 tsp peanut oil
1.5 tbsp fresh ginger, grated              
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 tbsp Thai sweet chili sauce               
Finely chopped chili to taste
1/2 cup water                                       
1 tsp soy sauce
4 scallions, greens only, sliced fine    
2 tbsp red pepper, chopped fine
1/2 tsp sesame oil

Put shrimp in a bowl with Sherry and salt. Marinate 30 minutes, tossing occasionally.

Heat a wok or large skillet until very hot. While pan heats, pat shrimp dry with paper towels. Add 2 tablespoons peanut oil to pan. Add half the shrimp, in one layer, and stir fry until just pink, 1-2 minutes. Set aside.

Repeat with rest of shrimp. Return first batch to pan along with ginger, garlic, chili sauce, and chili. Stir fry 1 minute more. Add the water, soy sauce, scallion and bell pepper and cook until shrimp are cooked through, 1-2 minutes.

Transfer shrimp to a serving dish. Cook sauce until slightly thickened. Turn off heat, stir in sesame oil, and pour sauce over shrimp.

A nice thing about these shrimp is that they’re good hot, at room temperature, or even straight from the fridge.

I used 21/25 shrimp, because that’s what I had in the house. Used as a wrap, they really needed to be smaller. To get around that, I stuck toothpicks lengthwise into each one, so they’d stay flat while cooking. That let me put two of them on each radish wrap.

If you have trouble finding the radish wraps, lettuce or cabbage leaves should work just as well. They’d be perfect as part of a spring roll.

Every time I correspond with Brook - I end adding half a dozen new recipes to my "must-try" list!