Southern Fried Shrimp

Southern Fried Shrimp will make you want to stop eating at seafood restaurants. Fresh battered and fried shrimp at home put most of the seafood eateries to shame. Particularly if you live inland from the shore, you’re likely to be eating frozen, battered shrimp with the breading being overpowering.

It’s not hard to make your own Southern Fried Shrimp, but it does take more time and effort than boiled shrimp or shrimp on the barbecue grill. It’s definitely worth the effort. Southern Fried Shrimp are delicious and the cook up very pretty too. They look like the chef dropped by your house and made these.

Southern Fried Shrimp

• 1 cup plain flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 cup ice water
• 1 egg
• 2 TBS cooking oil (plus oil for frying the shrimp)
• 1 pound shrimp (or 1 ½ lbs if buying heads on)

Directions:

First, mix up the batter. Mix the salt in the flour in a small bowl. Beat the egg lightly. Add the egg, water and 2 TBS cooking oil. Stir this well. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator. The batter needs to chill 20 minutes or so which gives you time to work on the shrimp and heat up the oil for frying.

Next, prepare the shrimp. You need medium sized, or that’s the easiest to work with. The tail portions would be about 2 to 3 inches long, if you don’t know the sizing.

Twist the heads off if you buy the shrimp with the heads on. I do when I can, because the juices hold better with heads on.

Then peel off the hard shell, but leave the little tail tips on. I suppose you could pull off the little tails, but the presentation is nicer with those on.

Butterfly the body of the shrimp. To do this, look for the black vein piece. Cut there from the tail up to the top cutting almost through to the bottom of the shrimp. Use the knife tip to remove the black vein. I won’t explain what that is, but you really do not want to eat it.

Put the butterflied shrimp in a bowl.

Now, heat up a pan of cooking oil about 1 inch deep. You want the oil pretty hot – around 375° F.

Dip or drag the shrimp one at a time through the batter mix and place in oil. If you get splatters, drop the heat just a tad. Cook until lightly brown and flip. This takes about 2 or 3 minutes per side. Shrimp cooks fast, so when the batter is an attractive light brown color, the shrimp are definitely done.

Place the shrimp on a plate with paper towels to absorb oil. Serve as soon as possible. If it’s a cold day, you can heat the oven to very low and keep the plate in there with the oven door propped very slightly to keep the shrimp warm as you’re frying them all up.

If you have any fried shrimp left over, then you can freeze these and heat them in the oven at 350° F until hot through. They are best fresh but still very good frozen and reheated.