Spanish-Style Garlic Shrimp

I was just about to post a squid recipe I made a few nights
ago based on a dish from Charlie Trotter's, but realized that I hadn't posted one of the key elements of that dish on this site - the Spanish-style garlic shrimp I make very frequently at home. 

This shrimp recipe needs to be on this site, in all of its garlic, olive oil and paprika glory.  I had shrimp made in this style a few times in Spain last summer (San Sebastian specifically) and it was indeed very similar to my recipe, though they tend to broil the same ingredients in clay pot (which comes out sizzling). I also make it a bit more refined by straining some of the sauce elements, but you can skip that step.  I do when I'm just making this casually at home.

So today you get one of my favorite ways to make shrimp.  I'll post the squid dish that incorporates this shrimp recipe soon. Until then....

Ingredient Shopping List
Recipe serves two or three as an appetizer. 

12 jumbo shrimp with shell on (see notes below)
one bunch parsley
bag/jar of sweet Spanish or Hungarian paprika
2 large or 3 small cloves of garlic
1 small white onion (Vidalia preferable)
1 lemon
crushed red pepper flakes
kosher salt, freshly ground pepper
extra virgin olive oil
Crusty baguette to sop up the sauce

Preparing the Ingredients
Peel and roughly chop two medium or large cloves of garlic. Slice the onion into quarters. Take one quarter of the onion and chop into a small dice. Rough chop a handful of fresh parsley, or about two tablespoons. Get your paprika and red pepper flakes ready.

Prepare the Shrimp
To take off the shrimp shells, hold the shrimp tail shell with your thumb and gently peel off the shell from the rest of the body. Leave the tail shell that you've kept on the shrimp for ease of eating and a nice presentation.

You now need to devein the shrimp. As you may know, shrimp can have a small vein that should be removed. It only takes a few minutes. Take a sharp paring knife and make a small vertical slice along the bottom of the shrimp. Remove the vein with the tip of your pairing knife and discard onto a nearby paper towel. Do this for all of the shrimp.

Dry the Shrimp
The goal is to get the shrimp as dry as possible for sauteing. You want the shrimp to turn out a bit caramelized and browned, so drying them is essential.

Take two paper towels and place them on top of each other on your cutting board. Place the shrimp on the paper towels. Take another paper towel and place on top of the shrimp, gently patting dry and absorbing the moisture. If very wet, do this again with fresh paper towels.

Once they are drier, sprinkle each side with kosher salt and pepper.

Saute the Shrimp
Coat the bottom of a heavy pan with olive oil. Be generous, this is worthy of two large glugs of oil. Set on medium heat. Bring all of your ingredients to the pan, as you will use them all rather quickly at this point.

Put in the onion. Immediately add a pinch of salt. Add three pinches of paprika and two pinches of the red pepper flakes. Add garlic a minute later. Shake the pan to mix the ingredients and add another pinch of salt. Add your shrimp right after the garlic, spreading across the pan without touching. Do not crowd the pan, as this will lower the temperature and will not get the char we are looking for (You may need to do this in batches for larger quantities.  yeah yeah, stop being lazy).

Do not touch the shrimp for two and a half, three minutes. Shake the pan after two minutes if you are concerned about the garlic burning. Don't worry though, a toasty brown is fine for this dish, as we'll strain this for the sauce later . . . just don't burn the garlic.

Flip the shrimp. As soon as you flip them, squeeze some fresh lemon onto them, add a handful of chopped parsley, then turn off the heat. The shrimp will be mostly done, but the heat in the pan will continue to cook them.

Finish the Dish
Take out your shrimp after a minute with tongs and arrange on your plate or serving platter. Next, take a small strainer and place over a small bowl. Add about five tablespoon to 1/8 cup of water to the sauce in the pan to get it to a sauce like consistency.

Stir and pour through the strainer over the bowl. You'll get a reddish, olive oil sauce with a deep garlic flavor. Taste, add salt and pepper if needed. Add the rest of the parsley to this and spoon over shrimp.

Garnish plate with whole parsley leaves and lemon and serve, preferably with bread.

Comments

[Gabe]

Just made this dish for dinner. FANTASTIC! Amazing flavor. I didn't really put enough oil in to have much of a sauce but the onion and garlic mixture with the smokey Pimenton was absolutely amazing. Thank you for a great recipe. Much appreciated. Gabe, Pacific Palisades, CA.

[Casandra, Spanish translator]

Compared to those plane King size shrimps that they serve at our restaurants these ones are amazingly flavoured.
http://www.all-translations.com/services/spanish-translation.html

[ShanitDidi]

I love your blog and that it follows the seasons to inspire the use of the freshest ingredients at their peak.

thanks for your Spanish style shrimp recipe. I was on the beach in the south of spain and really enjoyed this dish all the time! this is a close enuf replica so I can satisfy my taste buds back here at home

[Noura]

Hello!

Thank you so much for this blog :) I just tried the Spanish-Style Garlic Shrimp and it turned out amazing!! hats-off chef ;)
PS. I'll try your other favourites soon inshaAllah!

Noura