From: Bunny Finch
I can't believe I cook this- blame it on Gwyn. It's a big messy project, but somehow fun to make. After attempts at turkey breast stuffed with chestnuts, butterfly pork loin with spinach, and other disasters, this is Bunny's traditional Christmas Eve Dinner. Can Be made a whole day in advance! Always delicious! Dinner is soup, salad, bread, and wine (yes, wine). But, being a Finches, we also have to have a bunch of appetizers to start with, and rich desserts to finish off. Voila, you're still stuffed by the end of the night!
Helpful Hints:
Don't put the shrimp shells down the garbage disposal. You may not be as lucky as I to get a plumber to your house on Christmas Eve day (twice).
I bought a food mill just for this recipe and it works nicely.
Strangely, try and use shrimp with heads. Yuck.
Really good after sitting a day- the soup that is.
36 large shrimp, preferably with heads (about 3 pounds)
2 medium size onions
4 cloves garlic, chopped
6 jalapeños chilies, seeded
8 thyme springs or 1 teaspoon dried
4 tablespoons rendered bacon fat
6 cups chicken broth
6 medium-sized Roma tomatoes, peeled, seeded, and chopped
1/4 pound smoked salmon, thinly sliced and cut into 1/8 x 1 inch strips
2 cups heavy cream
Tabasco sauce
salt and pepper
Peel and de-vein the shrimp. Save the shells and heads and reserve the shrimp. In a 4-quart pot over medium heat, cook the vegetables, shrimp shells (with heads if you have them), and thyme in bacon fat for 10 minutes.
If the shrimp have heads, break them up in the pot with a thick wooden spoon.
Add the broth and the tomatoes. Cover the pot and simmer for 30 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes.
Strain the soup through a colander or a coarse sieve into a clean pot. Puree the cooked shells and vegetables in a food processor or blender and add the puree to the soup. Bring the soup to a simmer for five minutes to get all the flavors out of the puree and then strain it again through the disk of a food mill or strainer. Discard the solids that won't go through the food mill or strainer.
Add the smoked salmon, heavy cream, and reserve shrimp to the soup and simmer for 3 minutes while stirring. This soup is quite spicy, but if you want it hotter, add Tabasco. Season with salt and pepper.
Makes 8 servings, Bon Appetit!