Being a good husband, Chris decided to not leave prior to the blizzard that wasn’t. However, he made that decision after he’d already stocked me up for the storm. Well, what I would cook for me and what I would cook for us is completely different, so I hit the freezer and defrosted some shrimp, found enough whole wheat pasta in the pantry for both of us and decided to make this dish.
It’s based upon this one from Cooking Light, the only changes I made were to reduce the amount of oil, use whole wheat pasta (going for that Simply Filling version) and adding some chopped green pepper to bulk up the veggies (and b/c that green pepper was about to go bad).
It came out well. I’m happy with the results and will make it again.
Ingredients
- 4t olive oil, divided
- 1 pound shrimp, cleaned (I use the frozen ones from costco, 30-40 count per pound)
- 1 medium onion, chopped
- 1 green pepper, chopped
- 1 1/2T chopped garlic, divided
- 1t crushed red pepper
- 1/2t dried basil
- 1/2t dried oregano
- 2T tomato paste
- 1T lemon juice
- 1/2t salt
- 1.5C crushed tomatoes
- 1 14.5oz can diced tomatoes, drained
- 8oz whole wheat pasta (I used rotini but you could use spaghetti or penne too)
Directions
Cook the pasta according to package directions. Meanwhile, warm 2t olive oil in large saute pan. Add shrimp and 1/2T garlic and cook about 5 minutes until shrimp are done. Put in separate plate and set aside.
Add remaining oil to pan, saute onion and green pepper until softened about five minutes. Stir in garlic, crushed red pepper, basil and oregano, and cook 1 minute (until you smell the garlic). Then add tomato paste and lemon juice, cook another a minute or two until it gets a brown hue. Add crushed tomatoes, diced tomatoes and salt, cook five minutes until thick.
Return shrimp and garlic to sauce, cook another minute or two until warmed through. Add pasta to the sauce and toss to serve.
Note: After prepping all the ingredients, from the time I put the water on to boil with a lid, I was able to cook the sauce so that I was able to keep the sauce on a warm flame and not return the shrimp to it until the pasta was almost cooked.
