Shrimp and Grits

Heather Jones

Here's our final (for now?) shrimp and grits recipe! This is the one I chose when I first went looking for a recipe to make for my husband, and it's the one I keep returning to because the whole family likes it. It's originally from The Boathouse restaurant in Charleston, SC, though I can't say how this compares, since I've never eaten there.

Andouille has a great flavor that when eaten alone can be quite spicy, but in this dish it provides a nice heat without being overpowering. You can adjust the other seasonings to your taste, but as written it's not too spicy for my daughter, who really doesn't like spice.

I really use this recipe as a template now, and rarely look at the recipe when I make it. I've made it without tomatoes, added wine or lemon juice to the sauce, with and without Old Bay... It's very forgiving!

Here's the recipe I used the first time I made this: https://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/spicy-shrimp-with-andouille-sausage-on-grits-103619

For the grits:

2 cups water

2 cups whole milk

1 cup Old Fashioned Grits

4 tbsp unsalted butter

For the sauce:

4 tbsp olive oil

8 oz, Smoked Andouille Sausage, cut into bite size pieces

1 red bell pepper, diced

1 green bell pepper, diced

1 medium yellow onion, diced

4 plum tomato, diced

4 cloves garlic, minced

1.50 lb(s), shrimp

1 tsp cajun or creole seasoning

1 tsp old bay seasoning

Captions

[00:00]: [Music]
[00:04]: hello and welcome to cooking the books
[00:06]: with heather today
[00:07]: we are not cooking from a book we are
[00:09]: going to be making
[00:10]: shrimp and grits my way
[00:13]: so first we're going to start with the
[00:15]: grits and
[00:17]: this is the way i always make grits
[00:21]: for breakfast for whatever uh except at
[00:24]: the end we're going to add some cheese
[00:25]: so also i'm making a double batch this
[00:28]: time because we have some friends coming
[00:30]: over
[00:30]: in our bubble to you know have some have
[00:33]: some dinner with us
[00:34]: and uh so it's going to be a very large
[00:37]: batch of
[00:38]: shrimp and grits so about twice as much
[00:41]: as i've made before
[00:42]: twice as much shrimp as for sure so
[00:45]: let's get started with the grits
[00:47]: in this pot i have four cups
[00:50]: of whole milk uh
[00:54]: four tablespoons of unsalted butter
[00:58]: let me go ahead and turn this on and
[01:00]: start it
[01:02]: kind of high to get it boiling and i'm
[01:04]: going to add
[01:05]: four cups of water it just looks white
[01:07]: because i use the same measuring cup
[01:08]: that's all
[01:09]: so this is going to pretty much fill up
[01:12]: this pan
[01:16]: so we're going to keep our fingers
[01:17]: crossed we do okay with this and don't
[01:19]: let it boil over
[01:23]: so i've got the water and milk basically
[01:26]: all the grits that i've ever seen have a
[01:29]: four parts liquid to one part grits and
[01:32]: and that is what we're doing here so but
[01:34]: i use half milk and half water
[01:36]: so and i usually throw in some butter
[01:39]: and i'm going to add
[01:40]: some salt here i'm just going to add a
[01:43]: teaspoon right now
[01:45]: it'll probably need more we can fix that
[01:48]: later
[01:49]: we're going to add some cheese as well
[01:51]: so that'll add a little more salt so we
[01:54]: just don't want to over
[01:55]: salt it at this point so while this is
[01:58]: coming up to a boil i'm going to let you
[01:60]: know
[02:00]: some of the other ingredients that i
[02:02]: have ready for
[02:03]: the uh the sauce portion of the shrimp
[02:06]: and grits
[02:09]: i have probably a full pound
[02:12]: of andouille that i have sliced into
[02:16]: a half rounds and relatively thick i
[02:19]: just sort of
[02:20]: bite size however you like to slice it
[02:23]: is fine
[02:24]: um i have
[02:29]: in this bowl you can't see it now but
[02:30]: when we dump it out in our pan you will
[02:32]: i have a lot of onion on the bottom so i
[02:35]: basically used
[02:36]: two medium yellow onions medium to large
[02:40]: that come in the bags not the really
[02:42]: huge ones yellow onions
[02:45]: two red bell peppers and two
[02:48]: kind of small green bell peppers so
[02:52]: all just sort of medium diced so that's
[02:56]: in that bowl
[02:57]: and in this bowl i have six plum
[03:00]: tomatoes
[03:02]: it's not tomato season so they're not
[03:03]: the best tomatoes but we're going to
[03:04]: cook them
[03:05]: it'll be fine i did start
[03:09]: with i did start with a recipe here that
[03:11]: i made
[03:14]: several years ago probably more than 10
[03:16]: years ago honestly before we had kids
[03:19]: that i made this recipe and over the
[03:22]: years i've just sort of
[03:23]: changed it a little bit and there's a
[03:24]: part i don't do but i'll link the recipe
[03:26]: that i started with
[03:27]: down below so you can see that as well
[03:32]: so there's that i've got some chopped
[03:35]: garlic
[03:35]: quite a lot of chopped garlic here i
[03:37]: think it was about five
[03:38]: cloves and then um
[03:42]: i've got some old bay and
[03:45]: some creole seasoning um the the
[03:48]: seasoning that i use is not always this
[03:50]: sometimes i put together my own
[03:52]: it just depends on what i have on hand
[03:55]: um but that's what we're gonna do today
[03:58]: and now we're just
[03:60]: continuing to wait for our water and
[04:02]: milk to come to a boil
[04:05]: so my my water and milk has started to
[04:08]: boil
[04:09]: and go ahead and get my grits in there
[04:11]: to bring it down a little bit
[04:14]: and whisk it in
[04:19]: this is going to be a very full pan
[04:23]: but now we're going to turn the heat
[04:25]: down quite a lot
[04:26]: because i want to cook this pretty
[04:28]: slowly
[04:30]: i do not want it to boil over so i'm
[04:32]: going to cook it
[04:33]: really slowly probably even lower than
[04:36]: this
[04:38]: but i'm going to put the cover on it and
[04:40]: turn it down and put the cover on it
[04:42]: and just uh whisk it occasionally
[04:46]: as i think about it every so often i'm
[04:48]: gonna turn it down to probably a two
[04:51]: on my stove and put the cover the lid on
[04:54]: it
[04:55]: and that will sit until we're ready to
[04:57]: deal with it
[04:58]: besides occasionally checking it i do
[05:00]: like to keep my
[05:02]: measuring cup around because it's a good
[05:03]: place to put my whisk or anything else
[05:05]: i'm using my grits
[05:06]: using disturb my grits up with or serve
[05:08]: them with because
[05:11]: grits get really really sticky when they
[05:13]: dry
[05:14]: and it's hard to get off and so at least
[05:15]: this is something that's already
[05:17]: dirty and can go in the dishwasher
[05:21]: so now we're going to start the sauce
[05:24]: and i've got this
[05:25]: really large deep pan that we're going
[05:29]: to cook the sauce in and i'm going to
[05:31]: get that going on medium high heat
[05:34]: and i'm just going to i'm not going to
[05:35]: measure this because i
[05:37]: never do but i'm gonna just sort of get
[05:39]: a good
[05:41]: large drizzle of olive oil in the bottom
[05:43]: so it'll
[05:44]: kind of cover the bottom of the pan if
[05:46]: you had to
[05:47]: ask i would say that's probably one to
[05:50]: two tablespoons depends on your pan
[05:53]: whatever if you want to go light on it
[05:56]: because you're
[05:56]: looking to save calories i'm sure it'll
[05:58]: work fine
[05:59]: um so we're gonna let that heat up
[06:03]: which actually will be a lot faster than
[06:06]: the boiling of the
[06:07]: milk make sure yeah
[06:11]: it's sort of simmering under there which
[06:13]: is what you're looking for
[06:15]: um it's warm but not super hot but i'm
[06:17]: going to go ahead and put in
[06:20]: the sausage this is andouille
[06:23]: you could use um
[06:27]: any sort of smoked sausage that you like
[06:29]: but i want to
[06:30]: get the sausage to sort of start to cook
[06:32]: and release some of their
[06:33]: flavor into the oil before i
[06:36]: add the vegetables
[06:41]: so once this starts to brown a little
[06:43]: bit then we'll add
[06:45]: the onions and the peppers to this
[06:49]: so these are starting to brown the the
[06:52]: pan is pretty much up to its temperature
[06:55]: now i think
[06:57]: so we're going to add this heavy bowl
[07:01]: of green peppers red peppers
[07:04]: and onion here and we're going to cook
[07:08]: all of this until if these are pretty
[07:11]: soft
[07:12]: we want those to be pretty done and as
[07:14]: you can tell there is a lot
[07:16]: of this a lot a lot um
[07:30]: double batch is going to be huge that's
[07:33]: okay
[07:43]: i'm going to go ahead and add
[07:46]: a clean slate i'm going to add just a
[07:49]: little bit of salt and pepper just to
[07:51]: sort of
[07:52]: uh help the vegetables cook a little bit
[07:59]: layering the flavor seasoning as we go
[08:06]: that sausage is very well seasoned too
[08:08]: so we don't need
[08:10]: a ton and the creole seasoning is very
[08:13]: heavy on
[08:14]: salt so we also want to be careful with
[08:15]: that so i'm just going to be here
[08:18]: giving this a stir occasionally if i
[08:21]: feel like it's sticking a lot i may add
[08:23]: a little bit more oil
[08:25]: more olive oil but just waiting until
[08:28]: these vegetables are cooked
[08:29]: it's pretty full so it might take a
[08:32]: little while but we'll be good
[08:34]: and when i have a minute
[08:37]: doing a little
[08:41]: whisk on my grits to
[08:44]: make sure they're not too lumpy
[08:50]: there we go they're definitely cooking
[08:56]: slowly as i want them to so
[09:01]: we'll just be here doing those two
[09:03]: things until
[09:05]: the vegetables are cooked to my liking
[09:08]: okay uh the vegetables are pretty much
[09:11]: where i want them to be they're
[09:13]: the onions are kind of translucent and
[09:15]: so i'm gonna add
[09:16]: the garlic
[09:19]: i'm gonna add the garlic it was about
[09:21]: five large cloves because that's what i
[09:24]: had available
[09:25]: and uh i just use that
[09:30]: i'm gonna let this cook for just a
[09:32]: little bit until i can smell the garlic
[09:42]: there we go about a minute
[09:49]: and now i'm gonna add the tomatoes which
[09:52]: is gonna make this
[09:52]: very very full but that's okay
[09:59]: okay so now i'm gonna add about a
[10:04]: teaspoon each of the old bay
[10:08]: and the creole seasoning and my
[10:12]: teaspoon won't fit in there so i'm gonna
[10:15]: have a little bit of an over spilled
[10:16]: situation but that's okay
[10:20]: all right so now we're going to cook
[10:21]: this
[10:24]: just a little bit we don't want this to
[10:26]: become like a super
[10:27]: thick tomato sauce or anything like that
[10:30]: it's going to still be
[10:31]: a little fresh so now we're going to
[10:34]: just let the this cook for
[10:35]: just a little bit um and
[10:39]: another man overboard and then we'll
[10:40]: have to
[10:42]: trade my stuff out to do
[10:46]: um the shrimp because we're gonna do the
[10:49]: shrimp in a separate pan
[10:51]: which is something i took from the deep
[10:53]: brown roots recipe that i really like
[10:55]: especially when i'm doing a double batch
[10:57]: and it's huge
[10:58]: and full like this but
[11:03]: we're going to take a look at my grits
[11:05]: they are not done yet
[11:10]: but they are definitely cooking
[11:17]: i'm going to give them a good whisk
[11:23]: get out any lumps
[11:26]: make sure they're not sticking you to
[11:28]: the bottom which at this
[11:29]: heat they probably won't unless you let
[11:32]: them go for way
[11:33]: too long so
[11:41]: there we go they are almost done
[11:44]: i'm going to move this out of the way
[11:46]: hot
[11:47]: and uh put the lid on
[11:52]: and move these to the back burner
[11:59]: and move this over here
[12:03]: just to sort of keep warm and cook a
[12:05]: little bit while we
[12:08]: um while we cook our shrimp
[12:12]: so now i've got another pan for my
[12:15]: shrimp
[12:16]: here and i'm gonna once again
[12:21]: just sort of cover the bottom a little
[12:22]: bit with some olive oil
[12:28]: it's decent salt level a little bit of
[12:30]: spice from the crayola seasoning
[12:32]: and the andouille that'll be good i
[12:35]: think i'm going to turn this up a little
[12:38]: bit
[12:39]: to maybe break the tomatoes down a
[12:41]: little bit more
[12:42]: while we cook our shrimp
[12:46]: the shrimp i have are 21.25 so they're
[12:49]: like
[12:50]: i think they call them extra jumbo that
[12:51]: means they're 21 to 25
[12:53]: per pound and i have three pounds of
[12:56]: shrimp here
[12:60]: and so i want to i do want to wait until
[13:01]: this comes up to temperature
[13:06]: so we're not just
[13:09]: bringing the temperature down very
[13:10]: quickly when we put the
[13:12]: kind of cold shrimp in there
[13:16]: all right ooh our pan is starting to get
[13:18]: smoky so
[13:19]: i'm gonna go ahead and put
[13:25]: something there i'm gonna add
[13:29]: pretty much the same uh amount of
[13:32]: seasoning that i put into
[13:35]: the sauce here to just our shrimp
[13:41]: and then a teaspoon of each
[13:49]: and just a little bit more salt
[13:57]: i'm going to saute these
[14:02]: i might even turn the heat up a little
[14:03]: bit because we don't want them to just
[14:08]: sort of steam we kind of do we do want
[14:11]: them to saute
[14:13]: and we don't want too much juice here
[14:15]: we're gonna get all of our sauce
[14:17]: from this mixture which is looking
[14:20]: great i'm gonna turn it down
[14:23]: just a little bit check my
[14:26]: [Music]
[14:28]: lid it's getting
[14:35]: [Music]
[14:41]: just a little bit
[14:45]: so these should take not that long
[14:48]: when all of the shrimp are sort of
[14:49]: uniformly pink they're done you don't
[14:51]: want them
[14:57]: overcooked
[15:00]: i turned it up to like almost high
[15:03]: pretty high
[15:08]: which is a nine on my stove
[15:11]: everybody stove is different almost done
[15:14]: just a few of the shrimp still look not
[15:17]: quite
[15:18]: done but i'm going to call it pretty
[15:19]: done turn it
[15:21]: down a little bit and all i'm going to
[15:24]: do is squeeze
[15:26]: some lemon juice over top
[15:33]: i think i'm going to go with just half a
[15:35]: lemon
[15:40]: this is done this is done so now we have
[15:43]: to
[15:44]: these are really heavy finish our grits
[15:47]: so i'm just going to switch these around
[15:55]: there you go
[15:58]: trying to find places for everything is
[15:60]: always super fun
[16:02]: and these are pretty much like i want
[16:05]: them to be
[16:06]: they can maybe thicken up
[16:09]: a little bit but first
[16:13]: i'm going to add the cheese so i have
[16:16]: what is probably two to three
[16:19]: ounces of a i think this is a grana
[16:22]: padano
[16:23]: or parmesan cheese that we have grated
[16:26]: and we're just going to stir this in um
[16:29]: i don't
[16:30]: if i'm making breakfast grits i don't
[16:32]: ever put cheese in those because i think
[16:34]: my kids don't like it as much with
[16:35]: cheese in it i don't know why it's weird
[16:38]: um but so if you were doing breakfast
[16:42]: grits i would be done
[16:43]: before this cheese step but with the
[16:46]: shrimp ingredients we like a little
[16:48]: cheese in it so
[16:49]: or i do and everybody else can do a
[16:51]: little bit
[16:53]: so i'm going to add the rest of this
[16:54]: cheese here
[16:60]: and then i'm going to get a spoon and
[17:01]: taste them and see
[17:03]: if we need any more salt in these
[17:07]: now that we've got all the cheese in
[17:08]: there they're very very hot
[17:10]: you have to be very careful very very
[17:17]: sticky
[17:19]: you could definitely use more salt so
[17:22]: i'm just going to add
[17:23]: probably about another teaspoon worth of
[17:26]: salt
[17:27]: here
[17:31]: and whisk that in
[17:37]: these were a stone ground uh
[17:40]: grits so they're a little coarser than
[17:44]: the more processed grits that i
[17:47]: generally make for breakfast but they're
[17:48]: a little more fancy so i decided i would
[17:50]: use them for this
[17:53]: and they're much more like the ones that
[17:55]: i made with the other shrimp and fruits
[17:56]: recipes i've
[17:57]: done for this channel all right
[18:11]: i think with everything that would be
[18:13]: good um if i were to eat these on their
[18:15]: own i would probably add a little more
[18:16]: salt
[18:21]: but since we're putting a sauce and the
[18:23]: shrimp on top
[18:24]: that will be it so what i'm going to do
[18:26]: is much like with the deeper roots
[18:29]: recipe
[18:30]: i'm going to
[18:33]: [Music]
[18:34]: put my grits on the plate put some of
[18:36]: this sauce on the plate and then top it
[18:38]: with the shrimp
[18:39]: and we'll let you know what what it
[18:40]: tastes like and show you what it looks
[18:42]: like
[18:42]: in just a minute
[18:52]: on this episode of cooking the books
[18:53]: with heather you watched me make my
[18:55]: shrimp and grits recipe
[18:56]: i will include the link to the recipe
[18:58]: that i started with years ago
[19:01]: but i don't really follow that exactly
[19:03]: anymore
[19:04]: i just make my grits sort of the way i
[19:07]: always make them
[19:09]: i find it pretty easy it's
[19:12]: not very fussy i don't have to keep an
[19:14]: eye on them i don't have to whisk them
[19:16]: all of the time so that's great
[19:19]: and then the sauce we really like
[19:23]: andouille so that adds a little bit of
[19:25]: spice a little bit of the seasoning to
[19:27]: it
[19:28]: of course we add some other things to it
[19:29]: as well the other seasonings
[19:32]: but it's not super spicy so it's great
[19:34]: for all the whole family
[19:36]: and of course onions and peppers and
[19:38]: tomatoes
[19:39]: are sort of a classic combination and it
[19:42]: all just
[19:43]: makes a nice little bit of a sauce on
[19:46]: top of the grits
[19:47]: with the shrimp and so that's that's my
[19:50]: recipe
[19:51]: i hope you enjoy it i hope you try it
[19:52]: and let me know if you do
[19:54]: down in the comments what you think and
[19:59]: if you enjoyed watching me cook hit the
[20:02]: thumbs up button and subscribe and come
[20:04]: back
[20:05]: and watch me make something else