Shrimp with french lentils and roasted tomato vinaigrette
Roast
Roasting
This is a play on a dish we had at a sadly defunct restaurant in the Willamette valley called Paulée. The restaurant was about an hour away from our house, but we are big fans of the head chef, Daniel Mondok, so decided to make the trek. We had a 9 course tasting menu for our anniversary dinner that was truly spectacular. One of the dishes we had was grilled octopus with beluga lentils, charred tomato vinaigrette, and avocado. It was a great combination of flavors and textures – the meaty, slightly chewy octopus, the earthy lentils, and the creamy avocado were all tied together with the slightly tangy tomato vinaigrette. I made a mental note to try something similar at home. I decided to use shrimp rather than octopus, and used the shrimp shells to enhance chicken stock for cooking the lentils. I cooked the shrimp using the Cook's Illustrated method for pan-seared shrimp, as I find it produces shrimp that are flavorful and not overdone. For the vinaigrette I decided to oven roast tomatoes, and use some smokey spices to enhance the roasted flavor. The resulting dish has the qualities I was hoping for – the meaty, slightly sweet shrimp, the earthy lentils, the creamy avocado, and the slightly tangy tomato vinaigrette to tie it all together. It makes a great main course, but could also be used as a warm salad.
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