How to Butterfly Shrimp

Happy hump day guys!  Glad this week is almost over because Friday we set sail on our house boat trip!  And it's definitely a much needed vacation for Andy and I!

I thought I'd do a really quick how-to post today. 

One of my favorite things growing up was fried butterflied shrimp.  It's incredibly easy to butterfly those little guys, and you don't necessarily have to fry them afterwards.  Butterflying is useful because it gives the shrimp a neat appearance and increases the surface area for even cooking.  I ended up baking these guys off and tossing them into a summer vegetable pasta dish, but feel free to use them however you see fit!

#1.  Peel your shrimp, leaving the tail on or off, depending on your preference.

#2.  Lay the shrimp down flat and with a small knife (paring knives work great), make a deep cut that nearly slices the shrimp completely in half.  You'll want it to open like a book, basically.

#3.  Pull out the vein (digestive tract) and rinse shrimp under cold water to clean.

And voila!  Butterflied shrimp.  Now you can bread these suckers, use them for nigiri sushi, or cook them and toss them into your favorite pasta dish like we did!  The possibilities are endless!

You probably won't hear from me again until next week, as I'm cutting myself off from technology starting Friday morning - I might go through withdrawals because I've NEVER done that before.  EVER.  Good thing there will be plenty of beer on the house boat =)



Have a good week guys!