Recipe:Shrimp Alfredo with white wine sauce

This is my recipe for light(er than Olive Garden) Shrimp Alfredo with White Wine Garlic sauce.

Serves: 12

Calories: Don't want to think about it. I always mow the lawn after eating this so I don't have to.

Wine pairing: Not really needed, but a sweet wine like White Zinfandel would go great with the creamy garlic texture.

Prep time: Several hours. That's why I only make it if at all on weekends, when I have the time.

Ingredients

Sauce

• 4 Cups milk
• ½ Cup flour (or as much as needed until thick)
• 1½ Cup butter (to make the flour dissolve easier)
• 2 Cups shredded Parmesan cheese (or to desired thickness)
• 1 Cup strong white wine (any old grocery store garbage will do, the alcohol flavor and sweetness is what matters)
• 1 Pint Light cream (as opposed to the heavy whipping cream most restaurant recipes call for)

Vegetable Mix

• 1 jumbo Vidalia onion, diced
• 1 medium package baby bella Portabella mushrooms, diced
• 2 heads Garlic, mashed
• 2 Tbsp. Extra Virgin Olive Oil (don't worry about the calories, it mostly evaporates away at around 250°F anyway)
• 1 Tbsp. Black pepper

Secondary Vegetable Mix

• 3-4 large sweet Roma tomatoes, chunked (not diced)
• 2 Tbsp. Basil
• 1 Tbsp. Extra Virgin Olive Oil (unlike the first mix, the tomatoes soak it up before they boil)
• Diced Jalapeño peppers to taste

Main Noodle Mixture

• 2 Pkgs. thin spaghetti noodles (angel hair-like) (Approx. 20-24 Cups)
• 2 bags jumbo shrimp, detailed and peeled (Approx. 64 Pieces)
• 1 Tbsp. Cumin
• A pinch of salt each for noodles and shrimp
• Any spicing desired for noodles (remember...anything you dump in the water while they're boiling flavors them)

Cooking

Mix the first set of vegetables

This needs to be done first, as the other pots will keep them simmering, but not enough to burn

Dice the onion, mushrooms, and mashed garlic into a large egg skillet. Pour olive oil and pepper on, stir, and turn the stove on high. When a loud sizzling/crackling sound is heard, begin stirring constantly. Keep the heat lower if you don't like an overpowering garlic smell throughout the house. Stir until the onions are caramelized and the rest is a garlicky brown mush. At this point, about half the liquid has cooked off, turn the pan off and move it to an inactive back burner. Don't worry about the burnt-on residue, it will be removed without cleaning by a later step.

Make the sauce

First, prepare a white sauce base in a half gallon sauce pan on high. This is done by mixing 1 Tbsp. of Flour and 1 Tbsp. of Butter per 1 cup of milk at a boiling temperature. Be sure to add it gradually, or it will clump and the sauce will be un-salvageable. Add the flour before the butter, as the other way around will also ruin the sauce. Once the flour and butter are completely dissolved, bring the mixture back down from a semi-violent to a gentle boil, while continuing to stir constantly (the milk will scorch if you don't, making the pan REALLY hard to clean).

Once the base is boiling gently, begin mixing the other ingredients. Dump the cold cream in the low boiling mixture (despite what FoodNetwork tells you, a double boil will actually PREVENT the sauce from breaking). Bring back to a boil on high, then turn it back down before it becomes violent. Mix in the parmesan cheese until the sauce feels thick to stir. Now mix in the wine. One thing FoodNetwork is right about is that alcoholic and acidic things cause thin dairy sauces to curdle, so mixing in the wine before the cheese will break the sauce and give you a pan of very hot, spoiled milk, very un-master chef-like, no? MIX THE CHEESE FIRST!

Move the saucepan to another inactive burner or to a hotpad on the counter, whichever is available. Be sure to stir it whenever it develops a white "crust" throughout the rest of the recipe, as this is the cheese separating. NOT GOOD!

Boil the noodles and shrimp

This is your basic dumping stuff in boiling water. Fill a 10-Gallon soup pot halfway with water, get it to boil violently on high, sprinkle the salt and/or spices in, and dump the noodles in. Let them boil for 11-15 minutes (11 is tender, 13 is slippery, and 15 is falling apart), and dump them in a large colander. Let them sit until cool.

(Optional) Begin boiling a kettle of water for the sweet tea. We're Southern, so this is done at every meal here. When it whistles, dump it in a pitcher along with 1-2 Cups of sugar, and let 5-6 large black teabags (NOT an innuendo, promise ;)) hang from the handle into the water for 10 minutes. When the 10 minutes is up, take them out, wring them into the pitcher with a wooden spoon, and stir it. Either dump ice cubes in (up to 4 trays will melt almost immediately) or let sit until cool.

Now for the shrimp. They are cooked almost last, regardless of the impact on efficiency, because shrimp lose their flavor if left out too long. Take the raw shrimp out of the package, they should be almost thawed by this point, and de-tail and peel them. Not a trace of peel should be left, as they get crunchy and hard to remove when cooked. Refill the pasta pot with water, salt, and spices, and bring to a violent boil. Let the shrimp cook for 2-2½ minutes, or until pink/C-shaped, and dump the pasta (should be a cool, solid mass of noodles by this point) onto a large cutting board. Take the shrimp off the stove and dump them into the colander ASAP (they overcook very quickly, they are then rubbery, hard, and flavorless, do NOT overcook).

Preparation

Rinse the soup pot until cool, put it back on the (now off) stove, and mix everything (the sauce, shrimp, noodles, and veggies) together, using a large whisk to separate the noodles. Wait until it steams, then move it to a cold burner.

Dice the tomatoes/jalapeños and dump them in the garlic/onion/mushroom pan. Stir in the olive oil and basil and bring to a violent sizzle, as before. Stir until the tomatoes are brownish and 1 inch deep in their own juice. The burnt residue is gone, as promised. Dump them in the pot and stir until the sauce is a very light pink color. It is now time to serve, enjoy :)