Although I am a professional drinker by trade, I more broadly consider myself to just be a glutton. A glutton for “the things”…ALL the things…the things that we love…the things that make life amazing…the things that are the reason working people grind at jobs they hate for less money than they deserve…THOSE things.
And for me, one of those things is cooking. So from time to time I will make one of my dishes, give you the recipe, and add on a wine pairing to make it all 36% more sexy.
But a few ground rules, first:
One, if anyone ever follows any recipe of mine to the letter, I will be deeply disappointed. Think of my recipes as you would a paint-by-numbers canvas. I’m just showing you generally where things go…YOU make it your own. For that reason I will be withholding most of the step-by-step cooking details. Figuring shit out for yourself is part of the fun of cooking, and I would not dream of depriving you of that.
Two, I will NEVER put down the amount of garlic to be put into any dish. I put TONS of garlic into just about every dish that calls for ANY, but you do you. Have you heard that phrase, “season to taste”? Yeah, that…except with garlic. Read the room, and give the people what they want!
Three, I will alway choose a wine that you can find and afford. Will there be a more expensive, “better” pairing available? There always is…always. But my plan is to hip you to wines that you can get your hands on and drink right away. There are plenty of sommeliers on the internet who want to wow you with their bottles, and I encourage you to seek them out. Its fun!
But I do THIS.
And so I present to you the rustic yet elegant flavors of…
Sautéed Shrimp with Citrus Orzo and Pistachio Cream Sauce
1 pound box of orzo pasta (or in tonight’s case, something called “Acini di Pepe no. 78” instead. But any weird, tiny pasta will do.)
1 pound of shelled, tail-off shrimp (Stop pretending that the hassle of peeling hot ass shrimp with your bare hands is worth the 2% bump in flavor you get from cooking them with the shells and tails still on. Seriously…stop it.)
5 tablespoons of unsalted butter (or salted butter, okay? I’m not the boss of you. I just like being able to control the seasoning of a dish.)
1/2 pint heavy cream (It can say “whipping cream” on the container…just don’t whip it…or use actual whipped cream. Because, gross.)
Garlic (We talked about this…don’t make me repeat myself.)
6 ounces of shelled and rinsed pistachios (If you can find a shelled, unsalted, and unflavored version of this nut, you are the greatest human who ever lived.)
1 1/4 cups of parmesan cheese (Buy a block of the good stuff and grate it yourself, you lazy jerk.)
2 charred green onion stalks (for fancy garnish purposes)
2 tablespoons or so of Marcus’ Everyday Citrus* (The excellent ingredient with the wildly uncreative, placeholder name.)
Salt and pepper (Duh.)
*Okay, first let us talk about the citrus. About once a month I bust out the juice extractor and make something that is equal parts fresh squeezed lemon juice and fresh squeezed lime juice. Sometimes I throw the juice of a single blood orange in there, BECAUSE I’M CRAZY, but usually its just 12 lemons and 12 limes, juiced and put into plastic squeeze bottles. This gives me citrus for all my cocktails AND my cooking for a few weeks. Convenient!
Also, I’ve never had scurvy. These may be unconnected. We’ll never know.
Season and sauté the shrimp to halfway done and set aside. Sauté the garlic and nuts in the butter and transfer to a food processor. Add a bit of the cream and process to a slightly creamy, but still a bit crunchy texture. Put all that back in the pan, add the rest of the cream, season to taste, and add the shrimp to finish cooking in the sauce. Right before it’s ready to come off the stove, stir in a cup of the parmesan (leaving some to garnish with). When the pasta is done boiling, strain it, put it back in the pan, hit it with the citrus, and stir it through. At this point you can either dump a bunch of the pasta into the sauté pan (about half) and toss it though, or do what I do and plate the sauce on top of top of the pasta when you plate it, thereby controlling the sauce-to-pasta ratio. I’m not your real dad…do what makes you happy. Garnish with a bit of charred onion and parmesan.
Serves four Midwesterners (or nine Californians).
For the wine, I was torn. While I reject many of the traditional rules for wine pairing, one I still believe in is “what grows together, goes together”. As this is primarily a pistachio dish, I would like to have paired it with something from Iran…the ancient home of pistachios. Sadly, winemaking has been illegal in Iran since the Islamic Revolution, so instead I picked a wine from another ancient culture: the Italians.
Specifically, we are drinking the Tornatore Etna Bianco 2020 from the northern slopes of Mt. Etna in Sicily (100% Carricante grapes, DOC). $30 at TotalWine.
I was tempted to go with a fuller-bodied white like a Fiano, but I went with my gut and it turns out that the splendid acid (along with notes of green apple and winter herbs) refined the saltiness of the parmesan, the earthiness of the pistachios, and the taste of the sea within the shrimp…more than making up for its lightness on the palate (which I thought was going to be a problem…it TOTALLY was not).
Explore…enjoy…and keep ’em under you.
Cheers!
Marcus
