Ohh look at him, a real shrimp that’s not processed, SO SCARY!!!  No my friend, do not be scared of this delicious sea-bug.  I will show you how to clean and devein Chuck here (yes I named him Chuck).  Why would you even buy an unprocessed shrimp as opposed to the nicely packaged shrimp in a bag?  Well one, a pound of giant shrimps like these will cost you ~$15/lb at the grocery store if you’re lucky.  If you clean them and devein them yourself, they are $5/lb at the Asian grocery stores.  For smaller shrimp, $3.50/lb.  It takes about 5-10 minutes to process them, definitely worth the time!  Plus I spit on those who lets a good shrimp head go to waste.  SPIT!  You have to eat the shrimp heads, suck the brains out, nomnom.  Ok if you are too scared to eat the head, reserve the head and peel for a shrimp stock, it’s got mmm mmm flavor.

First, rinse Chuck under cold water and give him a good shower.  Then take some kitchen shears and give his tentacles a good trim, and feel free to snip off the tip of the head including the eyeballs, who wants to look at eyeballs when they’re eating Chuck?  The spike on top of his head is quite pokey, so be careful when handling, take your shears and follow the contour of his head and snip it right off.  Think of it as a shrimp mohawk, and you’re the establishment and decided that he has to be shaven bald.   When you are done, your shrimp should look like this, no more eyes, tentacles fairly trimmed down (you can leave them on too if you like tentacles… ):

Now it’s time to devein Chuck.  This is the part where we remove his intestinal tract, it’s usually full of dirt and shrimp poop, so we really don’t want to cook that along with our shrimp.  First, make an incision right between the head and the body with your kitchen shears, about an inch long.  You can actually go the whole way as well and sometimes it might be very necessary if your shrimp has really dirty poop.  These were fairly clean and I only cut an inch to keep the integrity of the shell a little better during cooking.  You should see the vein after you’ve made this incision.  See where I’m pointing to it with my index finger?  That brown line there is the poop chute.

Now with your fingers/nails, grab a hold of the vein and pull it right out.  It helps to straighten the entire shrimp body when doing this.  If the vein isn’t coming out very easily with a little pressure, consider splitting your shrimp out all the way to the tail.  Rinse your shrimp under cold water to remove any residue.   This is what should be coming out.

As you can see, Chuck and his fellow shrimp did not eat a big meal before their deaths, so their intestinal tract is not that dirty.  I’ve seen much worse, where the entire thing is just black.  Gross.  It’s not harmful to you if it’s not cleaned 100%, it might just make your shrimp a little sandy and gross psychologically, but it’s not gunna kill you.

After your shrimp is prepped, time to fry them!!

Evie’s Salt and Pepper Shrimp

Ingredients:

• 1 lb head-on shrimp, cleaned and deveined and dried with paper towel
• 1/4 cup flour
• 2 tablespoons corn starch
• a pinch of salt
• 1 tablespoon kosher or sea salt
• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon Szechuan numbing pepper (optional) or a few slices of jalapenos
• enough canola oil to cover the shrimp in the wok in batches

Directions:

1. Combine the flour, corn starch, and a pinch of salt in a large bowl.  Add the cleaned and deveined shrimp, toss to coat.
2. Heat up canola oil in wok, the oil should be about 375 degrees, but I just gauge it by eye.  It should not be smoking, and it should look hot and glossy enough for a proper fry.
3. Fry the shrimp in batches, 4 or 5 at a time.  I had about 14, so finished frying in 3 batches.  They don’t need to be fried very long, about 4 minutes should do it, lay the shrimp on a paper towel to drain.
4. Discard the oil and wash the wok and reheat.  Add the kosher salt, ground black pepper, and the Szechuan numbing pepper to a hot wok.  Stir for about a minute so the pepper can get a bit aromatic and flavorful.  Add the shrimp to the salt and pepper mixture and stir to cover, about another minute.  
5. Plate and Serve Chuck and his friends with sauteed pea shoots over rice!