We eat almost two kilos of shrimp and prawns per person every year, most of them at Christmas and on those days, mainly cooked beforehand. In this country we cannot conceive the birth of Jesus without these crustaceans: it is strange that we have not incorporated them into the Bethlehem, peeking out of the shepherd boys' pouch, crowning the bowl of myrrh, replacing the original wings of the archangel Saint Gabriel.
But look how the prawns drink in the river, but look how the newborn god sucks the heads: in December and January we pounce on full trays with infinite eagerness, peel our little decapod treasures and rudely bathe them in mayonnaise because, oh white christmasOh, white sauce, authentic blanket of snow from our dinners. How crazy we are.
Why are we crazy about cooked shrimp? What's more: why do we buy them already cooked? Or cooked, peeled and frozen! How many people believe that they are little dolls brought by three shellfish hunters from the East on the isothermal humps of their camels? How much do you not know that these animals once had marine life and moved their little legs and antennae; that their orange tones transfer that color to the rockfish that devour them or that they are not produced in the same factories as tinsel, Mariah's funkos and red underwear?
At Christmas, three cups
“At Christmas, the consumption of shrimp and prawns triples. But the price does not rise as much as other seafood, because it is what is called 'hook product' in the market. It is used as a lure for you to go and buy other products, especially in large stores. “That's why it doesn't shoot.” It is explained by Beatriz Aguado, commercial director of Gambastar, a company that moves 15,000 tons of seafood in its warehouses in Burgos, which it markets under the brand Prawnfresh. “We receive from all the ports in Spain, and also from aquaculture in Central and South America, and we are a shuttle for southern Europe.” Do you sell fresh or cooked? “For the customer, cooked, of course, because it is very comfortable.”
We have to review the word comfort, because behind its polysemy we hide some very questionable laziness. How much time and effort does it take to cook a fresh shrimp, for God's sake? Let's see: you put a pot with salt and boiling water, throw in the shrimp, wait a minute or two and take it out, cooling it to stop the cooking (in this video we tell you in detail, you just have to adjust the time according to the size of your crustaceans ). But if you take longer to sing the entire chorus of Last Christmas!
In fact, there is a colossal incongruity in bellowing to the world that aigueifyumaijart, and then despise these delights out of laziness. Look: you have no heart if you buy cooked shrimp or prawns; You don't feel the true magic of Santa Claus, you don't reflect in the balls on the tree nor do you deserve a mistletoe bite. From this indignant forum we say “enough of crustaceans cooked outside the home”: I explain myself below with some data.
Ask, choose and then cook
He says Spain food consumption report that our annual tray of shrimp and prawns weighs 90,000 tons; expressed in currency, 1,034 million euros (almost the budget of the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries). In proportion, they occupy 28.3% of the national seafood business. Because, let's say it now, they are the seafood of the humble, and more and more of us are humble, science-neuriststhe whitebait, “the one who fights and does not receive a medal”. Mr. Krabs is taking everything.
The Bobs, Squidwards and Patricks We pay between 10 and 50 euros per kilo for our affordable 10-legged whims, which we often do not distinguish. That is partly why prices fluctuate so much, because hyperabundance ends up misinforming us. We don't understand the basics. To focus: shrimp are smaller, between five and eight centimeters, compared to 10 and 20 centimeters for prawns (or 30, in the huge “tiger” ones). The shrimp has a curved tail; the shrimp, straight. The lady, long and thin body compared to the dimensions of her head; the gentleman, flat and fat body.
Both add up, in turn, to a hundred species that we barely identify, except for those labeled by their origin (Huelva, Palamós, Vinaroz, Sanlúcar), which are more expensive. But, in reality, the common Christmas shrimp, the one that most of the families in Bikini Bottom can afford, “basically comes from Tunisia, Morocco, Greece or Italy, while the prawns have their origin in Morocco, Mauritania or Mozambique ”, according to this complete report. If we ignore the category of the animal, we also do not know if it is worth what we pay, and even more so if we put it in the basket already boiled. In 2021, we buy 16% more in this vague format. I know, you're exhausted, you're tired. But a good shrimp can, precisely, lift your spirits.
There is not just one shrimp
“At Christmas, shrimp come out from under the stones. Some have very little quality, but they are cooked in broths made with good seafood so that they have some flavor,” says Antonio Gómez, from Gómez Santana Brothers, a family business from Huelva that serves marine catches of the day. “It is true that prices vary a lot. We only work in Isla Cristina and Vila Real de San Antonio, and if I sell it for 25 euros per kilo, I know that it is the cheapest price here. If someone has it at a lower price, it is from somewhere else,” he says, proud.
When saying “poor quality” we include other attributes apart from flavor, such as the concentration of cadmium, which is higher in uncontrolled fishing and aquaculture, and which already led to an alert from the Spanish Food Safety Agency about heavy metals in 2019. Some conservation and freezing processes also ruin the Christmas hooliganism, with that industrial aftertaste of dodgy ultra-processing. Mayonnaise, logically, masks the bad nature, the variable quality, which is always easier to detect in a fresh product. First of all, because when you buy it, you can see it and sniff it: if it is flabby, bad; If it smells like ammonia, too, and if it has frost, bad. Shiny shell, translucent head, spotless body, whiskers and very stiff legs: that's your shrimp.
Shellfish bought boiled are usually overcooked, like school macaroni, and frozen ones are also rubberier because they lose too much water. You will eat them quickly, but their satisfaction will last less time than if you had found some fresh specimens to the beat of Wham! That being said, if you want to prepare them in a flash, they are much, much tastier grilled, that's how it is. Heat from hell, jet of oil, salt, smoke and out. Suck the skeleton, suck the head, suck the tail, suck like there's no New Year, suck like a mad lover before attacking the body.
February will arrive, with its gray sadness and the duvet covered alone. Think of all that beneficial iodine filling your thyroid, plugging energy into your metabolism, think of the Little Mermaid or Aquaman cradling your lower belly. Think about good camelids—without discussing whether the Three Wise Men come on a camel or dromedary—and that Christmas is only a banquet when the food opens those innocent George Michael eyes to us, wanting to hug 10 hands.
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