Ballymaloe Potted Shrimp

A traditional Irish starter, this Ballymaloe potted shrimp recipe is from the Ballymaloe Restaurant cookbook, updated by Irish cooking teacher and doyenne Darina Allen. Flavored with garlic and lemon juice, this Irish recipe is fresh and so tasty. 

Unlike English potted shrimp, the Irish version doesn't have nutmeg which makes this my favorite potted shrimp. Not that I don't like nutmeg but I've always kind of thought it weird with shrimp. The Irish also use Atlantic shrimp instead of the Morecambe Bay brown shrimp typical in English potted shrimp. I used wild caught cold water shrimp which I thought might be close to the Irish ones. 

When Myrtle Allen opened Ballymaloe Restaurant in East Cork back in 1964, it was a revolutionary place, serving delicious recipes using only local seasonal ingredients. It would not be an understatement to say that Ballymaloe changed Irish food culture with that emphasis. 

Her daughter-in-law, Darina Allen, a chef in her own right, continued Myrtle’s legacy and expanded her reach when, along with her brother, she opened the Ballymaloe Cookery School in 1983. Darina is also a leader in the Slow Food Movement in Ireland. 

Darina's own daughter-in-law Rachel Allen is a well-known food writer, cookbook author and tv chef as well as also teaching at the Ballymaloe Cookery School. I'm pretty sure when you search "Irish chef," photos of the Allen family appear near the top of the list!

Ballymaloe Potted Shrimp

Darina says that this amount serves four as a first course – and it is rich because of the clarified butter - but two of us polished this off in no time. I anticipated that, as you can see, by only putting it in two little pots. If I were indeed serving four, I'd double the amounts. Although the recipe is originally from the Ballymaloe Cookbook, Darina also shared it online, in a tribute to Keith Floyd. 

Ingredients

1 small clove garlic

1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt

2 oz or 56g clarified butter or ghee, with extra as needed

1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves (plus tender sprigs to garnish, if desired)

freshly ground black pepper

4 oz or 110g (about 1 cup) shelled, cooked salad shrimp

2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

Method

Use the side of a wide knife to crush the garlic into a paste with the salt. I hit the garlic clove once then added the salt, which makes it easier to crush. 

Bring the clarified butter to a low boil along with the thyme leaves, crushed garlic and a couple of grinds of black pepper. 

Add the shrimp and toss for about 30 seconds. Set aside to rest. Season with a little more salt, if necessary and add the lemon juice. Stir to combine.

 

Pack the shrimp into little pots and pour over the clarified butter. 

Melt a little more ghee as need to just about cover the shrimp. Finish each pot with the tender end of a fresh thyme sprig. 

Put the pots into the refrigerator and leave to set. Potted shrimp will keep in the refrigerated for three or four days so they are a great make-ahead starter for dinner parties.

Remove the little pots from the refrigerator and leave to come to room temperature before serving with sourdough bread or sliced baguette.

Enjoy! 

It’s been seven great years posting recipes with my Fish Friday Foodie friends so I am sad to say that this will be our final group post. Many thanks to Wendy from A Day in the Life on the Farm who started this group and kept us motivated to add more seafood to our menu plans for so long. Today, in honor of St. Patrick’s Day, we are sharing Irish recipes. Check them out below. 

• Food Lust People Love cooked Ballymaloe Potted Shrimp
• Sid’s Sea Palm Cooking shares Boxty with Smoked Salmon
• Karen’s Kitchen Stories made Cod Soup
• Sneha’s Recipe has Dublin Lawyer(Shrimp in Irish Whiskey Cream Sauce)
• Faith, Hope, Love, & Luck Survive Despite a Whiskered Accomplice cooked up Fish & Potato Chowder with Irish Whiskey
• A Day in the Life on the Farm is serving Irish Fish Cakes

Fish Friday Foodies is ending its run but our recipes can still be found on our Pinterest page! Check it out for more wonderful fish and seafood recipe ideas.

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Salmon and Shrimp Strudel

This salmon and shrimp strudel is fish pie made fancy but that doesn’t mean it’s not easy! Puff pastry elevates this most tasty of fillings to fabulous. 

I’m a fan of pastry in all its forms, shortcrust, puff, rough puff, phyllo, what else have I missed? I firmly believe that with a bit of pastry any dish is made better, especially if it bakes up flakey, golden and maybe a little bit crunchy. 

For just that reason, for this month’s Fish Friday Foodie friends event, I chose seafood in pastry for our theme. I make this same dish with chicken for a fancy chicken pie but the salmon and shrimp version is way more flavorful. 

Salmon and Shrimp Strudel

Do not get too caught up in exact weights for the vegetables. I give the weights of mine to give you a guideline only. After all, my idea of what a small onion is may not be the same as your own. This makes enough filling for two salmon and shrimp strudels. I baked one the first day and saved the filling for about the third day, refrigerated, then baked the second. Both delicious and we were delighted to eat it again, just the two of us. If you are feeding four people, bake them both the same day! 

Ingredients - to serve four 

1/2 large or 1 whole small onion (about 5 1/3 oz or 150g)

1 long stalk celery, trimmed (about 2 3/4 oz or 78g)

1 - 2 medium carrots, cut in fine dice (ideally you want about the same amount of carrots as peas)

1 potato, cut in large dice (9 oz or 256g unpeeled) – soaked in cold water to stop it turning brown

1 1/2 cups or 380ml milk

1 teaspoon fine sea salt for poaching, plus extra at the end for final seasoning

10 oz or 284g wild salmon

1 lb or 450g thawed, peeled shrimp

1 slice streaky bacon

2 tablespoons or 28g butter or a little bit extra as needed

1/4 cup or 31g flour

2 tablespoons or 30ml heavy cream

1 tablespoon whole grained mustard

Zest and juice of ½ lemon

3/4 cup or 95g frozen peas, thawed

1 teaspoon fine sea salt, or to taste

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1/2 teaspoon cayenne

2 (9 oz or 255g) all butter puff pastry sheet (I used the Trader Joe’s brand), thawed

Method

Peel and mince the onion. Remove the tough strings and mince the celery. Peel and cut the carrots into small dice. Notice the peas for size comparison. 

Poach the salmon in simmering milk, skin side down, for 10 minutes. 

Remove the salmon from the pot with a slotted spoon and add the shrimp. 

Bring it back up to temperature and then turn it down to simmer for about 5 minutes. 

While the shrimp poach, carefully remove the skin from the salmon and discard. 

(Or fry till crispy with a little oil in a nonstick skillet as the chef’s treat. We always do!)

Remove the shrimp from the pot with a slotted spoon and set aside to cool. 

Cook the potato cubes in the reserved poaching liquid for about five minutes or until almost cooked through. Use a slotted spoon to remove from the liquid. Pour the liquid into another vessel and set both aside to cool.  

Wash the pot out and then fry the bacon strip in it. Remove it from the pot when crispy. Chop the bacon into small strips.

Add the butter to any bacon fat left in the pan and sauté the onion, celery and carrots in it for about 10-12 minutes, covered, until softened. 

Test a carrot piece. If it’s cooked or just about, you are good to go. 

Slowly sprinkle the flour onto the vegetables and stir well with each addition. 

We are trying to avoid lumps of flour. Add a little more butter if the flour is dry. 

Cook for a few minutes. Stir in the poaching liquid slowly. 

Cook for a couple of minutes until the mixture thickens a little. 

Remove the pan from the heat. 

Add in the bacon, cream, mustard, lemon zest and juice. Stir well. 

Add in cooked potatoes and the shrimp, along with any juice that has accumulated on the cooling plate. Use your hands to break the salmon into smaller pieces and add them to the pot. Don’t go too small or they will ending breaking down completely when you fold to mix. Top with the peas.

Fold the ingredients together gently. Sprinkle with a little salt, the black pepper and cayenne, if using. 

Fold the ingredients again to combine. 

Refrigerate the filling, covered, until it is chilled and you are ready to bake the strudel. 

When you are ready to bake, preheat your oven to 400°F or 200°C.

Lay one square of the puff pastry out on piece of baking parchment. 

Use a rolling pin to roll it out a little more from the middle, creating a rectangle out of your puff pastry square. 

Pile half of the cold filling in the middle of the puff pastry.

Cut slits in each side about a 1/2 inch or 1 cm in width. Leave the ends intact. 

Fold one end up and tuck the sides toward the middle. Fold the other end up and pinch to connect them to hold in the filling. 

Cut the rest of the pastry outside into pieces. Randomly pull each cut piece up and over, connecting them together over the filling and pinching to make them hold, knowing that they probably won’t but, hey, it’s worth a try. 

If you are baking both strudels the same day, put the first filled one in the refrigerator and repeat the process with the second puff pastry and the rest of the filling.

Bake the strudel in your preheated oven for about 35-40 minutes or until the pastry is puffed and golden and the filling is hot through. (Use a thermometer to check.) If it’s browning more quickly than it is heating through, you can cover it with foil. 

Remove from the oven and leave to rest for about 10 minutes before slicing to serve.  

Enjoy! 

Check out the lovely pastry seafood dishes my Fish Friday Foodie friends are sharing today: 

• Gluten Free Prawn /Shrimp Quiche - with Homemade Gluten Free Pie Crust from Sneha's Recipe
• Salmon and Shrimp Strudel from Food Lust People Love
• Shrimp Cups from A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Shrimp in a Blanket from Karen's Kitchen Stories

Would you like to join Fish Friday Foodies? We post and share new seafood/fish recipes on the third Friday of the month. To join our group please email Wendy at wendyklik1517 (at) gmail.com. Visit our Facebook page and Pinterest page for more wonderful fish and seafood recipe ideas.

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Lemon Ricotta Lobster Ravioli

Lemon ricotta lobster ravioli are easy to make and even easier to eat with their light, flavorful filling and tender pasta outside. Truly it’s a special meal for any special person or occasion. 

As I said in my original spinach and cheese ravioli post, our family loves the group project of making ravioli. The joint effort produces more ravioli much faster which helps us not feel so bad when they are eaten even more quickly. And they do disappear quickly. 

I was on my own making these lemon ricotta lobster ravioli so I decided to pare down the ingredients for the pasta dough and make just enough for about 24 ravioli, a manageable amount and still more that my husband and I could eat at one sitting. It’s always nice to have some leftovers of a nice dish and I can assure you, this is indeed a Very Nice Dish.

Lemon Ricotta Lobster Ravioli

You can serve this with your favorite sauce, but one caveat: Choose one that will complement and not overwhelm the flavors in your filling. We want that lobster to shine! I’ve included the ingredient list and instructions for my garlic browned butter wine sauce, in case you’d like to try it as well. It’s not the prettiest color but, oh, the flavor! So good. For the lobster meat, I used two lobster tails (8 1/4 oz or 230g total weight) and steamed them for about 7 minutes until internal temp reached 160°F or 71°C.

Ingredients

For the pasta dough:

1 1/2 - 1 2/3 cups or 187.5- 208g tipo 00 flour (plus extra for rolling out the pasta)

1 egg 

1 egg yolk (save white for filling)

2 teaspoons olive oil or salad oil 

1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt

For the ravioli filling:

4 oz or 112g cooked lobster meat, chopped

1 large clove garlic, minced

1/2 cup or 125g whole milk ricotta cheese

1 egg white

Zest of 1 lemon

1 sprig Italian parsley, just leaves, chopped finely, plus extra for garnish, if desired

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

For the garlic brown butter wine sauce (optional):

3 tablespoons butter

1 clove garlic, sliced as thinly as possible

2 tablespoons flour

1/4 cup or 60ml dry white wine

1 cup or 240ml lobster or seafood stock (from a cube is fine – I used shrimp)

1/2 teaspoon salt

Method

In large bowl, combine 3/4 cup or 94g flour, 1/4 cup or 60ml water and remaining dough ingredients. With mixer at slow speed, beat for two minutes, occasionally scraping the bowl with a rubber spatula.

Using a wooden spoon or a Danish dough whisk, stir in enough of remaining flour to make a soft dough.

Turn out onto floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 10 minutes. Wrap in cling film and let stand at least 30 minutes. (After the 30 minutes, refrigerate the dough if you are making this ahead of time.)

While the dough rests, we can get on to the ravioli filling. It couldn’t be simpler. Mix all the ingredients together well in a mixing bowl. Set aside.

Once the dough has rested, cut it in four equal pieces and remove one. Wrap the rest of the dough again with the cling film.

Flour the dough ball well and use a rolling pin or a pasta roller to roll it out quite thinly to the size of your ravioli plaque. Check out my original ravioli post to see my roller in action.

Flour your ravioli plaque liberally and lay the sheet of pasta on top. Fill each hole with about a teaspoon of the filling.

Using the second quarter of the dough and, following the same instructions, roll it out to the size of your ravioli plaque.

Use a pastry brush to wet the pasta on the plaque between the spoons of filling.

Carefully, starting at one end, lay the second sheet of pasta on top of the filled one, sticking the two sheets together and pressing out the air as you go along.

Turn the ravioli plaque over and let the filled pasta drop out onto your countertop. If it sticks, just gently pry it off.

Trim the ravioli around the edges and cut them apart.

Set them aside on a plate lined with cling film that has been well floured.

Continue the process until all the ravioli are rolled out, filled and cut apart. I put another layer of cling film and flour again with each layer of ravioli.

The ravioli should be stored in the refrigerator, covered with cling film until you are ready to boil them.

I re-rolled the scraps that were cut off and just made a few noodles with them so they didn't go to waste. I cooked those a different night to add to a veggie stir-fry.

If you are making my garlic brown butter wine sauce, now’s the time. If not prepare your own sauce.

Cook the butter over a medium heat, watching it carefully and stirring occasionally until it turns a nutty caramel color. 

Add in the sliced garlic and cook stirring for about 15-20 seconds. 

Immediately whisk in the flour until it's incorporated into the butter.

Slowly pour in the wine and stock and whisk until creamy. Cook over a medium heat until the sauce reduces slightly and thickens. 

Add the salt and stir well. Keep warm until the ravioli are cooked. 

To cook the ravioli, boil water with salt and a little olive oil in a large pot, as you would for regular pasta, and lower the ravioli in gently a few at a time. Stir gently so they don’t stick to each other or the bottom of the pot. They only take a few minutes to cook. 

Remove with a slotted spoon and tap it gently on a folded paper towel to get rid of most of the water. 

Serve with the sauce of your choice or my garlic brown butter wine sauce. Spoon over the ravioli to serve.

Garnish with chopped parsley, if desired. 

Enjoy!

It’s Fish Friday Foodie time and this month we are starting the year off in style by sharing lobster recipes. Check out the links below! Many thanks to our host Camilla of Culinary Cam. 

• Keto Lobster Scrambled Eggs by Sneha's Recipe
• Lemon Ricotta Lobster Ravioli by Food Lust People Love
• Lobster Tacos by A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Spicy Lobster Bao by Karen’s Kitchen Stories
• Surf and Turf (Grilled Steak and Lobster) by Palatable Pastime
• Warm Lobster Salad by Culinary Cam

Would you like to join Fish Friday Foodies? We post and share new seafood/fish recipes on the third Friday of the month. To join our group please email Wendy at wendyklik1517 (at) gmail.com. Visit our Facebook page and Pinterest page for more wonderful fish and seafood recipe ideas.

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