The Best Tool To Peel Shrimp Is Already In Your Cutlery Drawer

Whether it's served up in po'boy sandwiches, classic shrimp cocktail, or seafood stuffing, Americans sure do love their shrimp. If you love shrimp, at some point you're probably going to have to peel and clean the little buggers at home. Conventional wisdom usually calls for a sharp paring knife to get the job done, but, actually, as long as you have a pair of kitchen shears, which are probably already in your cutlery drawer, you've got the best tool for peeling shrimp shells.

There are a lot of ways to buy shrimp at the grocery store, from different sizes to cooked, fresh, and peeled. But by far the most economical way to buy shrimp at a supermarket is raw and frozen with the shells still intact, because the more seafood is handled and processed the more expensive it gets. Plus, it's super easy to de-shell your shrimp with scissors; you just have to make a few strategic cuts.

If you've never cleaned a raw shrimp before, the process is very simple. The most important step is making a cut along the back side of the piece of shrimp so that you can get at the dark vein inside, which is part of the animal's digestive tract and needs to be removed.

When your shrimp is thawed and ready to be cleaned, grab a piece with the back facing you and slide the edge of your scissors just under the shell in the center of the shrimp where the head was detached. If for some reason you want to buy shrimp with the heads still intact, you'll need to remove those first. Now, cut the shell all along the center of the back of the shrimp all the way to the tail.

Once you're finished cutting, pull the sides of the shrimp apart to expose the vein and remove it. After that, simply pull the shell away from the body of the shrimp. When the shell and vein is gone, it's a nice extra step to rinse the cleaned shrimp off with some water to make sure there aren't any shell or vein fragments remaining. Just make sure to clear your sink and everything within 3 feet away so that you don't spread any bacteria.

Once you've peeled the shells away from the shrimp, don't just toss them in the trash. Shrimp shells are the ideal base for making homemade seafood stock, which is like liquid gold when it's time to make recipes like homemade seafood stew or risotto. You can make about a quart of stock from just the shells from 1 pound of shrimp, and it only takes about an hour to make a batch from scratch.

If you're not ready to make stock the same day that you're cleaning and peeling the shrimp, they'll stay fresh in the refrigerator for a day or two. You can also collect the shells in a container in the freezer until you have enough to make a bigger batch of stock, just make sure to label and date whatever you freeze so that you use them up within three to six months. When it's time to make stock you can toss them right in the pot with some aromatic veggies and start cooking; no need to thaw.

Once you see how easy it is to clean shrimp is a couple of strategic snips with the kitchen shears, you'll always go for the bags of raw shrimp with the shells on. You'll save a few dollars by doing the cleaning work yourself, plus there'll be plenty of seafood stew in your future.