Pasta with Shrimp

How to prepare pasta with shrimp

1. Clean the shrimp of heads. These can be discarded or kept in the freezer for fish soup. Then clean the remaining shells. Fry the shells in slightly heated oil for 2-3 minutes until they turn pink and brown a bit.
2. Blend the oil and shrimp shells in a food processor, just a few pulses to break them up. Then strain through a sieve, keeping the infused orange oil. The shells can now be discarded, as we have extracted the aroma from them.
3. Bring plenty of salted water to boil and cook the pasta according to package instructions.
4. In a large pan (about 26-30cm) put 3 tablespoons of the infused oil from step 2 (the rest of the infused oil can be used for other recipes). Heat gently and add the cleaned shrimp in a single layer. If they do not all fit at once, fry them in two batches. Fry on the first side until nicely browned (about 1-2 minutes), then flip and leave only 10 seconds more, just until they change color to pink. Remove the shrimp from the pan.
6. In the remaining oil (if very hot, pull the pan off heat for a moment), add the fennel seeds, hot pepper paste, chili flakes and crushed garlic. Stir briefly until the garlic smells nice (1 minute).
7. Add the drained pasta and 2-3 tablespoons of the cooking water. Sprinkle salt. Stir over medium-high heat so the pasta is coated and absorbs the sauce from the pan. For 1 minute it will seem watery, but then you will see it becomes more consistent and clings to the pasta.
8. Add the fried shrimp, chopped parsley and fennel and the butter. Remove the pan from heat and stir until the butter melts completely and the herbs are evenly distributed. Serve immediately.
   * instead of fresh parsley I used the parsley left from making this parsley oil; everything left in the sieve I put in a small zip bag and keep in the freezer for such recipes

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