shrimp tacos & fried green tomatoes

good morning! a bit behind on outfit photos, so no ootd today, but considering pretty much all i did this weekend was cook & eat, i have no shortage of food to show & tell!

saturday morning we woke up and rode our bikes over to the fort greene farmer's market, certainly the one i frequent most often, as it's just a few blocks from our place. we filled up a backpack with all sorts of fruits and veggies and headed home; sam went out to skateboard, and i started to plot dinner.








sam and i used to eat tacos on a weekly basis, but i've slowed down on them a bit because they feel so bad for you - at least, the way we eat them: stuffed with fried fish, mexican corn, tons of cheese and sour cream. so i decided to try for a healthier version of the tacos, and you know what? i really think they were just as good.

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reasonably healthy shrimp tacos

3/4 lb shrimp
1 T olive oil
1 T hot sauce

1 cup halved cherry tomatoes

1/2 avocado, diced & squeezed with lime juice & sprinkled with salt

several sprigs of cilantro

red onion, thinly sliced into rings
1 T apple cider vinegar
a few peppercorns
1 t mustard seeds
salt & pepper

4 flour tortillas

1 small container 0% fage yogurt
juice of 1/4 lime
salt

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combine the sliced onion, vinegar, peppercorns, and mustard seeds in a bowl; mix well and set aside.

rinse & slice tomatoes.

rinse cilantro well.

combine the yogurt, lime juice, & salt. i used this in place of sour cream and i was AMAZED at what a good substitute it was. i am not someone who likes low-fat versions of ANYTHING, but in something with this many flavors, this worked great.

peel & devein the shrimp, then marinade in the oil & hot sauce; the hot sauce will start to cook it a bit, so don't do this until you're ready to get them on the grill pretty fast.

heat up a grill - we don't have any outdoor space, sadly, so i use this handy double-griddle i got as a wedding gift (thanks toby!) in its place, and it works really well. get it nice and hot, spear your shrimp on a few skewers, and let 'em grill. they'll turn pink and start to curl up; turn 'em, let em turn TOTALLY pink on both sides, and remove from heat. next throw your tortillas on there, about 30 seconds on each side so they get nice grill marks.

and that's it! this was pretty painless, super delicious, and relatively healthy. until i added the fried green tomatoes.









my taco (top) versus sam's. we both have a pretty healthy appetite (or unhealthy, you could say,) but he always piles on the toppings while i like my food simple, with a few flavors working together well and no one thing overpowering the other. i did a bit of research into this phenom this morning and as it turns out, girls have stronger tastebuds than boys! this is a broad generalization, of course, but it explains why i think a simple bowl of vanilla ice cream with strawberries is sheer heaven, while sam needs to drown his in caramel, chocolate, cookie pieces and three kinds of nuts to fully enjoy it.


as a side dish to the tacos, i decided to make fried green tomatoes - i'd attempted fried green tomatillos last week, with very disappointing results, and just couldn't get 'em outta my mind. so when we came upon a bin of green tomatoes, i pounced.

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classic fried green tomatoes

2 green tomatoes
2 T butter
1 cup flour
1 T turmeric
lots of salt & pepper

whisk together turmeric, salt & pepper with flour. put on a plate.

slice tomatoes about 1/2 inch thick. coat well in flour mixture.

heat a pan with butter until melted: fry tomatoes until well browned on both sides. salt again. lots of salt. salt salt salt.

add butter to the pan as needed.

that's really it! simple and good. but bad for you. on many levels! green tomatoes contain a toxin that isn't good for you in large doses, so don't eat these too often; on the other hand, said toxin is said to help prevent certain kinds of cancer, so it all evens out in the end. verdict: i'm not a doctor, eat whatever you want.





that's all from me for now! lots and lots of fancy food for tomorrow (sam's birthday wooooo!)

xo audrey