Shrimp & Fries, Gourmet Style

For larger families I imagine this would get pricey, but for Christmas dinner in our house we have seafood. This year it was jumbo prawns. Years ago my husband made me these shrimp for an anniversary dinner and now they are part of our regular recipe collection. Simple and easy these shrimp are gourmet if cooked correctly. Shrimp can quickly go from cooked to overcooked, so make sure you watch them carefully.

Lemon Pepper Grilled Shrimp
Ingredients
1 lb jumbo shrimp
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup lemon juice
2 Tbsp ground pepper
butter for melting/dipping

Directions
1. Combine olive oil, lemon juice, and pepper in a bowl.
2. Peel & De-vein shrimp.
3. Marinade in oil mixture for 15 minutes. (Marinading seafood for longer is not necessarily better, especially shrimp).
4. Heat grill.
5. Remove shrimp from marinade and place on skewers.
6. Grill or broil for 3 minute (can depend on size, but absolutely no more than 5 minutes).
7. Melt butter and use as a dip for cooked shrimp.
And as a side, I decided to try something new. The smaller you cut these homemade sweet potato fries, the more crispy and like a regular fry they will be. They were a little on the spicy side, so depending on how you like things, you might want to decrease the cayenne to 1/8 or just leave it out. For my husband however, they were perfect and he ate up an extras.

Sweet Potato Fries
Ingredients
1-2 large sweet potatoes (A 3 lb sweet potato make enough fries for 3-4 people)
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
4 Tbsp taco seasoning mix
1/4 Tsp cayenne pepper

Directions
1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
2. In a plastic bag, combine sweet potatoes, oil, taco seasoning, and cayenne pepper.
3. Close and shake the bag until the fries are evenly coated.
4. Spread fries out in a single layer on a large baking sheet.
5. Bake for 30 minutes, turn the fries over using a spatula, and cook for another 30 minutes, or until they are all crispy on the outside and tender inside.