Deixe sua cabeça: cioè: leave the head, in the case of shrimp.
It’s not an easy thing, to leave the head. And I’m not just talking about shrimp…
At first, at least in the case of the shrimp, it is not really easy to understand how to do it. In fact, in this photo the students haven’t done it perfectly. I explain to cut the initial part of the head, just behind the eyes, especially to eliminate the spur above the head. Then you can extract the stomach from the opening that is created, then you can cut the legs under the head (this hasn’t been done here), then, once the shell has been removed from the tail, you have to make a small incision to remove the intestine.
In reality, the real difficulty is psychological: people do not want to see a head on their plate and tend to remove it. Let alone hold it in their hands! In general, inexperienced people hold the shrimp in their hands in an awkward way and try to let it go immediately.
We are all used to finding ready-made foods, washed, cut, such as shrimp without the shell, even boiled and then frozen: products that are easy to use but devoid of flavor and nutrients, often dusted with preservatives and other dubious substances.
They have accustomed us to laziness. Not only with regards to shrimp, but all foods, starting with flours that are measured in “cups” and no longer with scales.
Flours are not all the same: a cup of 00 soft wheat flour does not correspond to a cup of semolina or a cup of rice flour. The volume is the same (the cup = 240 ml), but the weight certainly is not. Just as the percentages of macro and micro nutrients are not the same. Only the cups are the same: equal enough to avoid us having to think.
So, let’s go back to the grandmothers!
They knew the “how” even without knowing the why.
Grandmothers knew their bodies, how to move in a coordinated way; they knew how to do two opposite movements at the same time; they knew how to weigh without scales, how to “feel” consistencies under their hands. They knew how to smell and look. They recognized the sounds of food during preparation and cooking: the sizzling, the popping, the boiling, the crunching, the “slapping” of bread dough slapped on the table.
I don’t think they would have ever dreamed of buying peeled shrimp and cooking them. They knew they wouldn’t have any flavor.
They let themselves go, they let themselves be guided by their intuition.
Since I started with the shrimp example, I’ll continue with that. But what do you do with the shrimp head? Used alone, it can become a stock, a sauce, a broth. Attached to the tail, it increases the flavor of the preparation.
As well as chicken, lamb, hare and beef bones which are used to make broths and stocks.
So, first tip of the day: leave the shrimp’s head where it is..
The second piece of advice is more psychic: leave the head – your head – too much thinking and often heavy.
Even for this part it is not easy: it is difficult to leave our head, full of stereotypes, beliefs that are often not ours, morals, thoughts… Let yourself go; get out of the patterns, the marked tracks, the roads you knew, the mathematical equations and talk to the foods. Do as the grandmothers did, who had dedication and care and left their fears, together with the formulas they did not know, to listen to the food, to welcome it, to have the foods tell us how they wanted to be cooked. Let’s leave our heads clogged and free ourselves to hear what comes from outside.
Stop using cups and stop using scales. You can tell if a cake is good by the consistency of the dough.
Strange thing to say from a chef, right?
Use your eyes, your nose, your hearing, your touch. Your senses will help you find your sense of proportion and coordination. Smell a fresh shrimp, enjoy the scent of the sea that it exudes. Don’t be afraid: it must be treated with respect and with care. You will know, from the beginning, how to treat a shrimp, without wasting it. You will know how to respect it: exactly by using all its parts without waste. The shrimp – like every other living being we eat – will be more respected if we use every part of it. And we would have delicious and tasty morsels, instead of tasteless tails.
Deixa Isso Pra La
Deixa que digam, que pensem, que falem
Deixa isso pra lá
Vem pra cá
O que que tem
Eu não estou fazendo nada
Você tambem
Faz mal bater um papo
Assim gostoso com alguém?