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It’s the fresh herbs that give this shrimp and pasta dish its great flavor.
Light And Easy
This is such a light and easy “date night” kind of meal! It’s also a great meal to serve in the coming warm weather because it’s quick cooking as well as delicious.
And I have to say, this is one of the best recipes I’ve made in a couple of months. The original recipe comes from Taste of Home–which surprised me because a lot of their recipes are good old comfort food. This is a bit fancy–but don’t let appearances fool you because this is so easy to make, you won’t believe it!
Fresh Herbs
The recipe calls for fresh herbs. There was no, “if you don’t have…” listed and I’m not going to suggest it either. The wonderful flavor this dish has depends on using fresh herbs. So I urge you to buy some specially for this and they can be used in other recipes you make during the week. Remember, they can always be air-dried for use later. The herbs used in this recipe are not anything unusual, in fact, they’re pretty basic so I know you will use what you have left over.
Best yet if you grow a kitchen herb garden, I’m sure these herbs are in what you grow.
Good For Summer
The reason this is good for summer is everything cooks so quickly.
Angel hair pasta cooks extremely fast. You don’t even have to boil it. What I do is boil the water, put in the angel hair, stir it and let it sit for about 5 minutes. Perfect doneness and made that way, it won’t add much heat to the kitchen.
Shrimp as you know, is very quick cooking and here it’s no exception. The asparagus is fast too!
This uses a small amount of wine, which I feel adds to the great flavor. You can substitute water for that if you wish, but I encourage you to use the wine. I used chardonnay–my go-to wine for cooking.
The original recipe called for grated Parmesan cheese, but I forgot to add it and it still tasted great. I’ll leave that up to you if you want to use it.
The Recipe
Shrimp and Asparagus Primavera
Ingredients
- 3 ounces uncooked angel hair pasta
- 1/2 pound uncooked shrimp 16-20 per pound, peeled and deveined
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/8 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
- 2 tablespoons olive oil divided
- 8 fresh asparagus spears trimmed and cut into 2-inch pieces
- 1/2 cup sliced fresh mushrooms
- 1/4 cup chopped seeded tomato peeled
- 4 garlic cloves minced
- 2 teaspoons chopped green onion
- 1/2 cup white wine or chicken broth
- 1-1/2 teaspoons minced fresh basil
- 1-1/2 teaspoons minced fresh oregano
- 1-1/2 teaspoons minced fresh parsley
- 1-1/2 teaspoons minced fresh thyme
- 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese optional
- Lemon wedges
Instructions
- Cook pasta according to package directions. Meanwhile, sprinkle shrimp with salt and pepper flakes. In a large skillet or wok, heat 1 tablespoon oil over medium-high heat. Add shrimp; stir-fry until pink, 2-3 minutes. Remove; keep warm.
- In same skillet, stir-fry the next 5 ingredients in remaining oil until vegetables are crisp-tender, about 5 minutes. Add wine and seasonings. Return shrimp to pan.
- Drain pasta; add to shrimp mixture and toss gently. Cook and stir until heated through, 1-2 minutes. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese, if desired. Serve with lemon wedges.
Angelina says
Hi Judith 🙂 What a magnificent shrimp recipe! Sounds incredibly tasty, and not difficult to make. If I’m going to need to purchase several fresh herbs in order to make this dish, I’d doublet the recipe, so that I could also serve it to my in-laws. I’m wondering that if I wanted to make this easier on myself, could I use frozen shrimp? I’d use baby asparagus this time of the year, since it’s readily available. Also, most chefs frown upon using cheese with seafood, but (in my humble opinion) it definitely enhances this particular dish. Even Jacques Pepin asked for grated Parm with his shrimp dish at a famous restaurant once. The Head Chef was horrified, until he saw that it was Jacque, so he then said that it was ok. Jacques told this story on one of his cooking shows. This dish sounds so light & refreshing, so it’s definitely now in my ‘special recipes’ file.
Judith Hanneman says
Frozen shrimp should work fine. And funny you mention about the cheese–the original recipe called for it but I forgot to use it. The meal was super and I think the cheese would somehow detract from it (and I’m a real cheese freak too). This was one of the best things I’d made in a long time. That says lot!!!
Bruce Levitt says
your scaling of ingredians is not correct, espeically teh herbs.
to go from 2 serving to 4 it should fo from 1-1/2 teaspoons to 3 teaspoons or 1 tablespoons not 2 – 1 teaspooons (what ever that means)
Judith Hanneman says
The conversions are done by the app–they are not my conversions. I’ll bring it to the attention of the developer.