Shrimp Scampi with Fettuccine
Shrimp, garlic, white wine and parsley, and just enough butter for a rich, indulgent flavor.
Servings 4
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 pound peeled and deveined shrimp (see Kitchen Notes)
- 4 large garlic cloves, minced
- 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes (see Kitchen Notes)
- 1/2 cup dry white wine
- salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1 pound fettuccine (see Kitchen Notes)
- 1/2 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
Instructions
- Bring a large pot of water to a boil for pasta as you prep the other ingredients. This dish cooks very quickly once you start, so make sure you have everything ready.
- Cook pasta in boiling water until just tender, according to package instructions. When pasta is about 5 minutes from doneness, heat a 12-inch heavy skillet over medium-high heat. Add oil and sauté shrimp, turning over once, until just cooked through, about 2 minutes. Transfer shrimp to a bowl with a slotted spoon. Add garlic, red pepper flakes, wine, salt and pepper to pan and cook, stirring occasionally, 1 minute. Add butter to skillet, stirring until melted, and return shrimp to pan, stirring to coat with butter and garlic mixture. Remove skillet from heat.
- Drain pasta, reserving 1 cup pasta cooking water. Toss pasta with shrimp mixture and chopped parsley in large bowl, adding some of reserved cooking water if pasta seems too dry. Divide among four shallow bowls and serve.
Kitchen Notes
De-tails, de-tails. I've said this before and I know I'll say it again: I don’t know what the deal is with leaving tails on shrimp these days, but unless it’s finger food or meant to be cooked in the shell, don’t. It may look more elegant to some to leave the tail on, but there’s nothing elegant about picking up food that’s not meant to be finger food or, worse yet, picking bits of shrimp tails from your mouth as you eat. Lose the tails, please.
Pepper flakes: Be careful, they're hot. The red pepper flakes add a nice bit of spicy zing to the dish, that along with the wine, tempers some of the buttery richness. They're always a little more fiery than we give them credit for being, though, so know what level is right for you. In the recipe, we called for 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon. We used somewhere between the two, maybe 1/3 teaspoon, and it delivered a nice bite.
Keep the pasta on the hefty side. For this dish, we like broad, flat fettuccine noodles. They twirl nicely on the fork and hold their own with the chunky shrimp when it comes to mouthfeel. Linguine also works well for the same reasons. we've seen recipes that call for capellini, but that just seems like a mismatch.