Make This 20-Minute Spicy Shrimp Pasta at Home This Week
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I am the biggest sucker for seafood pasta. I order it just about every time I see it on a menu, regardless of how much seafood or pasta I’ve already eaten that day. The only thing that has even a hope of tempting me away from seafood pasta is pasta with sausage, and even then it would be a close decision, and I’d probably wind up talking someone else into ordering the other one so I could have both.
My obsession with seafood pasta is a little silly, because when I order food at restaurants I generally try to order things I couldn’t or wouldn’t cook at home, and a good shrimp pasta is one of the easiest things to cook at home in less than 20 minutes.
This particular shrimp pasta comes in a spicy tomato-cream sauce, and you can easily adjust the spiciness to the tastes of those at your table. The recipe calls for half a teaspoon of crushed red pepper flakes, and you could have that for a more mild version. If you like things spicy, go ahead and double it. Or just start tossing the red pepper flakes in. If someone eating the dish screams that it’s too spicy, that’s how you can tell it’s just about right.
Shrimp cook as fast as lightning, so this is a very quick dish to make for a weeknight dinner. The shrimp sauté in some olive oil and red pepper flakes until they’re cooked through, about two minutes. They’re set aside, and you use the same pan to sauté some onions and garlic, then pour in a jar of spaghetti sauce and some Italian seasoning. Using pre-made, jarred spaghetti sauce means this recipe takes no time at all to prepare. Boiling the pasta is almost certainly the most time-consuming part of the whole meal, and using a bit of garlic and onions helps give the jarred sauce a bit of extra kick and flavor.
As far as I’m concerned, shrimp pasta is one of the world’s most perfect foods. The only way to improve on shrimp pasta is to add cream. Oh look, this recipe adds cream! Half a cup of heavy cream adds a rich, smooth mouthfeel and creates a spicy, creamy sauce that sounds like it’d be perfect for a weeknight dinner in the middle of winter. Just add the cooked pasta and shrimp back to the pot and stir to combine. Taste it to make sure the spice level is appropriate and add some more chili flakes if necessary, and the whole meal is finished in about the time it would take to cook a pot of pasta.
Get the Recipe: Spicy Shrimp and Tomato Cream Pasta from Spicy Southern Kitchen
