Shrimp

I wasn't exactly thrilled that I had to work on Saturday, but by the time I got to the office my mood had changed.  We had horrible, windy weather all week but this morning was calm and beautiful so I decided to walk to the office.  Every Saturday morning at 8:00 am(except when the Ventura II is in port selling their fish) there is a Fisherman's Market set up near the fish pier.  There are usually about 6 or 8 local  small boat fishermen selling their catch.  In my grumpy mood I walked past the market but something made me turn around and go back.  With my laptop hanging from my shoulder I walked through the market, peeking into all of the fish bins.  There were spiny crabs, sanddabs, rockfish, lots of fish I didn't know the names of and beautiful Pacific Ocean Shrimp for $4.00/pound!!  Big spender that I am, I bought five dollar's worth of the shrimp.  My whole day was changed.  How lucky I am to be able to buy fresh-off-the-boat fish on my way to work. To prove how fresh the shrimp were, here is a video (sorry it's so long but I don't know how to edit:

I removed the heads, the shells (leaving the tails on) and cleaned the shrimp.  Look at how much beautiful shellfish I ended up with for $5:

I decided to cook the shrimp "scampi-style".   I sauteed the shrimp in olive oil for a couple of minutes.  Then removed them from the pan and added chopped garlic, white wine, chicken stock, lemon juice and reduced the sauce for about 5 minutes.  Next I swirled in some butter (actually a lot of butter), seasoned with salt & pepper and added the shrimp back into the pan to coat them in the sauce for a minute and sprinkled with parsley.  I served the shrimp on homemade pasta - delicious!  The shrimp were some of the sweetest I have ever tasted.