Comforting Shrimp Stew – one of the best recipes I’ve ever made! <3

Comfort food for me is all about integrating flavours and bringing different tastes together. I see eating is an experience and one that has to hit the right notes for me. I appreciate having sour, bitter, sweet, and spicy tastes balanced in my recipes. I find the simplicity of pure, wholesome and whole foods so intriguing and foundational to our taste. I’m always in search of new ideas and ways to create new recipes, and yet I somehow end up appreciating and going back to the basics. It is for this reason that I like to create depth of flavour using really simple ingredients that we may not even recognize go perfectly together.

There’s a reason why we enjoy our comfort foods and recipes that take us back to our childhood or roots. We all have a cherished and adored recipe made by our family members or loved that take us back in time. We can all remember a flavour or a specific recipe because of a certain time period or event. That food and that experience is now forever photographed and ingrained in our memory. How interesting that we find ourselves wanting to re-create these experiences and hold onto these memories! The way we eat and what we eat are both a byproduct of our environment and life experiences. Our eating habits, the food we eat, and how we eat ultimately shape who we are.

I find it incredibly important to value our daily consumptions and choose quality experiences that contribute to our wellness, and not take away from it. Anything less than is not an experience you want to keep. Our eating habits are also an emotional experience. We don’t want to emotionally consume and yet there’s such a truth to how our eating experiences make us feel. I put a high value on investing in my health and my recipes reflect that. Moving on…

This recipe is one that I put together back in Spring 2022 and I absolutely love it no matter the season. I made this heart warming, delicious and flavourful shrimp stew around at the time of my birthday (birth-week rather) and it supported me as I was going through a challenging time. The flavours simply work together perfectly and I really appreciate how I came up with this. The depth and layers of flavour in this stew are just so satisfying. I recommend this to anyone who wants to boost their energy, immune function, and mood. It works soo well and it’s hands down one of the best recipes I’ve ever been inspired to create.

Ingredients:

-300 grams Organic Shrimp – deveined and washed
-5 or 6 stems of fresh parsley, finely chopped
-Fresh cilantro, finely chopped as garnish
-1 stem per serving fresh green onions thinly sliced as garnish
-2 tablespoons fresh ginger, minced
-6 large garlic cloves, minced
-1 large onion, diced
-1 cup thinly sliced oyster or cremini mushroom
-4 large thinly sliced carrots
-2 cups chopped purple cabbage
*Note: you can also add a couple of cups of chopped cauliflower
-3 TBSP Tomato paste
-1 can full fat coconut milk
-1 cup hot water
-3 to 4 TBSP coconut aminos (you can add more if you want)
-2 TBSP fish sauce
-2 TBSP rice vinegar 
-2 TBSP avocado oil for sautéing 
-200 grams of angel hair pasta, washed thoroughly (honestly this really depends on you, I sometimes don’t even add this if I just like to have this stew as is. Or if you want more, you can use 2 packs of this product here. I love this one personally.

https://naturamarket.ca/miracle-noodle-ready-to-eat-keto-plant-based-noodles-angel-hair-200g.html?gclid=Cj0KCQiArsefBhCbARIsAP98hXRbtdNt5JkmqH9kJQwT78pg3WN8tWglpM6DdNCUWJJu_Bh26qafp_saAq1wEALw_wcB

Dry ingredients:
-1/2 teaspoon lemongrass
-1/2 teaspoon dried parsley 
-1/2 teaspoon dried basil
-1/2 teaspoon coriander
-1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
-1 teaspoon pink salt or sea salt
-1/2 teaspoon paprika (omit for AIP or if not tolerated well)
-1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper if tolerated (omit for AIP or if not tolerated well) 
-1/2 teaspoon turmeric

Instructions:

Use a large skillet on medium heat and add avocado oil. Wait for about 1-2 minutes until the skillet is heated and then add garlic. Give it a minute before you add the onion. Bring the heat down and sauté the onions on medium low heat for about 10 minutes – we don’t want it to caramelize so depending on your stove top, make sure you have it on lower side so the onions don’t turn brown. Although I like caramelized onions, this recipe doesn’t call for it. We want properly sautéed onions and garlic instead. The next step is to add the rest of the veggies and dried ingredients except for cilantro, green onions, and parsley and stir well for a few minutes. Then increase the heat to medium.

Mix in coconut milk, hot water, tomato paste, the sauces and rice vinegar. Stir well again and put the lead on and cook for about 20 minutes until the stew reaches a boiling point. Add angel hair pasta now and cook for another 5 minutes. You can now add shrimp and and put the lead back on again. Cook for another 5-7 minutes until it’s all cooked through. Now remove from heat, add your chopped parsley and stir will so the heat wilts the leaves down. To serve add cilantro and green onions as garnish on top.

I love this stew so much. I make it throughout the year and it just nourishes and makes me feel so incredibly comforted and at ease every time.