The Best Way to Cook Shrimp | Techniquely with Lan Lam

Shrimp is one of the most common proteins, yet home cooks often don’t get it right. In this episode of Techniquely, Lan Lam teaches you what to look for in order to have perfectly cooked shrimp every time.

The Best Shrimp Cocktail Recipe: https://cooks.io/3Fl8srh
Pan-Seared Shrimp with Peanuts, Black Pepper, and Lime Recipe: https://cooks.io/4kzU0ee
Why You Should Be Buying Your Shrimp Frozen: https://cooks.io/43FOJMf
The Best Shrimp Peeling Tools: https://cooks.io/4k3nlh1
Buy Our Winning Shrimp Peeler: https://cooks.io/4kwwoHk

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0:00 How to Tell if Shrimp is Overcooked
0:24 Why Shrimp are Tricky to Cook
0:57 How to Shop for Shrimp
2:13 Shrimp Scissors
2:41 Pan-Seared Shrimp
7:05 Shrimp Cocktail

you guys should try this It’s so good Did you know that at a glance you can tell if shrimp is cooked or overcooked turns out it’s all about the shape Just remember C is for cooked and O O is for overcooked Raw shrimp are slightly translucent and they’re quite flexible When you cook them they curl They turn opaque and they firm up The more you cook them the drier and tougher they get and the more they contract That’s why we want them to look like the letter C and not the letter O To get perfectly cooked shrimp you need to do two things You got to use a gentle cooking method and you want to make sure to remove them from the heat at just the right time This will keep them from going from tender and juicy to overcooked [Music] Before we can start cooking we need to talk about buying shrimp Fresh shrimp are highly perishable And so in many cases frozen is actually fresher That fresh shrimp you see that’s beautifully arranged on ice at a market it likely arrived frozen and then they defrosted it and arranged it on that ice in the display case There’s really no knowing when they defrosted it And that’s why I think it’s better to purchase frozen shrimp and then do the defrosting yourself Choosing packaged frozen shrimp means you can check the ingredient list So when I buy shrimp the only thing I want to see on here is shrimp Now sometimes you might see other ingredients listed like salt or sodium tripolyphosphate This bag has both STP is a preservative that helps the shrimp retain its color and it also keeps them from shedding less water when they’re defrosted Treated shrimp though they kind of cook up a little odd I’ve been in sideby-side tastings where the comment you get the most often is “These shrimp are kind of bouncy and they have an off flavor and nobody wants that.” Generally the shells have to be removed or or at least cut before the shrimp can be treated with STP So one easy way to avoid treated shrimp is to choose shell on shrimp We’ve got a whole article with shopping info and you can find a link in the description below If you eat a lot of shrimp you might want to invest in seafood scissors So I was a little skeptical when the ATK reviews team asked me to give them a try but I’m a believer now These have this nice little curve that lets them kind of glide along the back of the shrimp and they’ll cut through the shell and open up the vein all at the same time When I’m using them I like to go through and do all of the cutting at once And then um I’ll put these down That lets me kind of get into a rhythm since I’m not picking them up and putting them down every time After all the shrimp are cut then I’ll go back and do the shelling and debating Getting really good browning on shrimp without overcooking is tricky because they’re so small and quick to cook Here’s a gem of a recipe from Andrew Janjigian His pan seared shrimp with peanuts black pepper and cilantro has little easy but really important techniques that ensure success So I’m going to season this shrimp with some salt This is not going to take that long I’ll just give it a nice toss Now salt is made of two ions sodium and chloride and they’re really little And that’s why this salting process only takes 15 minutes Those sodium ions they move in and they season the shrimp And the chloride ions they’re just as important They’re going to keep the muscles from tightening up too much during cooking And that means the shrimp are not going to squeeze out as much water It’s been 15 minutes and so now I want to be careful to remove as much water as possible Going to do this by transferring these to a towel lined tray and spread these out I’m going to give the top a nice blotting I want to do this because water is going to impede browning Okay that looks pretty good These can go back in the bowl And it’s time to get some oil in here and some sugar And that’s just a tiny bit of sugar This sugar is in here because it’s actually going to help with the browning but it’s important to add it at the last minute Sugar is hyroscopic and that means it pulls water out of things In this case it’s going to pull the water out of the shrimp And as we said before water interferes with browning It also increases splattering So I have a cold non-stick skillet here and I’m just going to arrange these shrimp in this pan If you’ve got a carbon steel pan that’s going to work great too You just want to make sure these shrimp are in a single layer Getting that oil in early is really nice for a couple of reasons It means I don’t have to use as much oil It also means that I don’t have to pick up the pan and do a bunch of swirling to try to get it beneath the shrimp It’s just a lot easier Time to start cooking I just want to get the heat up to high I’m going to let these cook undisturbed And what I’m looking for is just nice browning on the bottom It’s going to take 3 to four minutes So this cold start it’s critical When you add shrimp to a smoking hot skillet they’re going to curl immediately And they don’t just curl into a sea That flat side that was flush against the skillet initially it’s going to curl up away from that pan And any bits that aren’t touching the pan they’re not going to brown A cold start means the shrimp are going to stay in contact with the pan just a little bit longer And between that and the sugar we can get this beautiful uniform golden brown color on all of our shrimp in about three minutes Preventing over cooking means we need to know when to cut the heat and move that pan off the burner So there’s enough heat stored in this pan to finish cooking the shrimp so long as we flip all the shrimp over and put the raw side onto the hot pan After I finish flipping I’m just going to give these 2 minutes Now you could be done here and have a really versatile protein for a salad or a grain bowl Or you could do this So I like to finish these shrimp by toasting out a seasoning mix that’s got some coriander pepper paprika garlic pepper flakes and a little sugar and salt Just going to add a little oil to this pan And this can go right in It just kind of wakes up the flavor of those spices So it only takes 30 seconds to toast out the spices Then the shrimp can go right in Quick little toss And then um I want to finish with a little lime juice and some cilantro And that’s it How easy is that so this is my favorite of the three flavor combinations that Andrew developed but you can find all of them on America’s TestKitchen.com or on the America’s Test Kitchen app Okay time to eat These smell so good These are perfectly seasoned They’re tender That little bit of sweetness and savoriness you get from the browning because of that cold start it’s perfect Those spices kind of pop on there I love this [Music] dish Sousid is the most foolproof way to poach because you can set that water bath 240° That’s the temperature where your shrimp is going to be perfectly cooked Then you just drop a bag of shrimp into that bath and set a timer It gets you a perfect shrimp every time But if you don’t have an immersion circulator or you just don’t want to spend an hour poaching shrimp what you need is Steve Dunn’s method for shrimp cocktail Now if you’ve only had shrimp cocktail out you really should consider making it at home It’s very easy He’s figured out a way to get you the results of suvid without the equipment And he’s not going to make you temp each shrimp individually So what we need to start is a quart of water I’m going to add some salt and some sugar These are both there just for seasoning That sugar really enhances the shrimp sweetness Now we just get our shrimp in there and they’re going to hang out for 15 minutes While they’re brining I want to set up the cooking liquid I’ve got a quart of water in this pot and I’m going to add a little bit of salt to this as well Then we’re going to wait All right this 15 minutes are up Instead of just putting the shrimp in the pot I’m going to put the shrimp and the brine in Because the shrimp is going to be served plain it’s important to cook it in seasoned water Rather than throwing out that brine which is seasoned with salt and sugar I’m just going to use it to cook the shrimp Rather than cranking the heat to high and getting this up to a boil as fast as I can I want to cook this shrimp gently So I’m only going to set the heat to medium Now the only thing left to do is to stir this occasionally to make sure there aren’t any hot spots and they’re cooking really evenly So here’s the key to this recipe If you’re using jumbo shrimp like the recipe calls for and you’ve got the right amount of water in this pot you can just keep track of the temperature of the water When that water hits 160° those shrimp are going to be a perfect 140 Great Let’s turn this off At this point I want to cool these as fast as possible I’ve got a little ice bath here and I’m just going to transfer these suckers over This ice bath is going to stop the cooking immediately which is going to keep the shrimp plump and tender It’s going to take about 10 minutes for these to completely cool down and then they can come out of this water and just hang out in the fridge until it’s time to eat [Music] Wouldn’t you love to serve this to your friends it is so easy and so elegant Now you could serve this with a classic cocktail sauce but Steve actually developed a bunch of sauces to go with his shrimp cocktail as well And you can find those recipes on our website or on the America’s Test Kitchen app There’s a creamy charmula It’s creamy It’s tangy The spices and herbs kind of pop It’s great Or this is my favorite It’s a riff on a cocktail sauce He’s added chipotles and adobo and lime juice between the heat of the chipotles and kind of that mustardy zing from the horseradish It’s fantastic All right let’s give this a try You guys should try this It’s so good These shrimp are so much better than the shrimp cocktail you’ve probably had it like purchase from a grocery store They’re so tender They’re perfectly seasoned A+ I’m going to double dip Sorry That cooking method couldn’t have been easier And it produces perfectly cooked shrimp You can see because they’re all C’s They’re not O’s [Music]