Shrimp Scampi on Quinoa, we’re back

Before I started writing this post I did a bit of research on the name.

After years of dining at a wide range of Italian – American (or would that American – Italian?) restaurants, I was a bit confused about scampi. Sometimes I saw ‘Shrimp Scampi’ but more often I saw ‘Scampi’ with shrimp listed as the main ingredient. At some point in time I started thinking that scampi was Italian for shrimp

It’s not.

Gamberetto is Italian for shrimp; scampi is from the Italian verb scampare – to escape.

The English definition of scampi is ‘a culinary preparation of various crustaceans’….. American English usually means shrimp in garlic butter; British English usually means the tail meat of langoustines.

Now I see the ‘Chicken Scampi’ and ‘Pasta Scampi’ and ‘who-knows-what Scampi’.

After all that bit I felt pretty safe naming this dish.

I’m not sure which is the best part – the smell of garlic slowly cooking in butter or the taste of the shrimp drenched in that butter.

We opted for quinoa rather than pasta.

Shrimp Scampi on Quinoa

Total time: 20 minutes

Ingredients:

Instructions:

Cook quinoa in chicken stock, simmering about 15 minutes

Zest lemon.

Cut lemon in half and cut off 2 slices for garnish.

Squeeze the remaining lemon for juice.

Melt butter in a nonstick skillet over medium-low heat.

Add garlic, leek and sauté until golden and tender, 5 – 7 minutes.

Turn heat up to medium and add shrimp. Sauté until shrimp start to curl and turn opaque.

Add lemon juice, wine and heat through.

To serve:

Arrange quinoa on a small platter.

Spoon shrimp and sauce on top.

Drizzle olive oil over the top, garnish with lemon slices and serve.

We’re back on line.

It was 5 days.

I can’t believe how dependent I’ve become on the internet.

I was actually a bit surprised at how much it bothered me.

It was an accumulation of little things. I went out to walk the dogs yesterday morning and there was snow on the ground.

Snow????

I had no idea it was going to snow – I hadn’t been able to check the weather for 5 days.

I was supposed to make my famous (at least in these parts) brownies for class on Monday. I got all the ingredients organized then went to check the recipe.

It’s on my blog.

I don’t have access to my blog without the internet. I scrambled around a bit and found a copy I had translated into French for someone….

We won’t even go into the countless questions that we’re asked and went unanswered because we couldn’t instantly Google it.

As to the reason for our unexpected downtime……

It likely had something to do with the high winds, although not as directly as we had suspected.

The wire stretches through 5 or 6 trees on it’s way from the post to the corner of our house. It had been suggested by the phone company 5 or 6 years ago that the trees be trimmed before they cause a problem.

The suggestion has been reiterated once or twice (by me, nicely, of course) but reassurances were given (by mon mari.…) that trimming was unnecessary as phone lines are very strong (ahem…).

We were informed me last Friday by the phone company that we would be charged if it was something we could have taken care of ourselves.

The trees were trimmed on Saturday – closing the barn door after the cows escaped and all that…. But, at least it’s done and we could pretend innocence.

It turns out that the problem was the last bit of original wire left in the house. It goes from the outside connector through the wall to the inside connector. I’m guessing that the wind in the trees pulled on it and broke it, but the break was inside the wall. The wire was just the length of the thickness of the wall – outside to inside. That little bit was our problem.

It has now been replaced. We don’t know if we’ll have to pay for the repair, but if we do it will be less than 75.00 which isn’t bad.

Life is back to normal chez nous…. Even the snow is gone.

Last update on February 4, 2015

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