Blackened Shrimp, Asparagus and Avocado Salad with Lemon Pepper Yogurt Dressing

Danielle's school had Teacher Appreciation Week, which means she came home with a desk full of gift cards, three candles (teachers get candles the way electricians get fried catfish — it's the universal thank-you), and a handmade card from a kid named Jaylen that said, "Mrs. Bomon you are the best teecher in the hole world." She put it on the fridge next to Rémy's latest crayon masterpiece, which is either a dog or a hurricane — we're not sure, and he won't clarify.

I spent most of the week on the new construction job in Gonzales. We're finally framed and dried in, which means I can start rough-in — running wire through the walls before the drywall goes up. It's my favorite part of the job, honestly. There's something satisfying about the skeleton of a house, seeing where everything goes before it's hidden. It's like the roux before the stock goes in — the foundation, the part nobody sees but everybody depends on. I brought my apprentice, a kid named Marcus, who is twenty-two and has the attention span of a hummingbird but good hands and a willingness to learn, which is what Joey said about me at that age, so I figure there's hope.

This was the week I decided to build the brick pit. Not decided, exactly — I've been thinking about it since we moved to Claycut Drive in 2009, but thinking and doing are different things, and I'm a man who does more thinking than he should when it comes to projects at his own house. (At other people's houses, I'm decisive. At mine, I stare at the backyard for seven years and think about maybe building a pit.) But I priced out the bricks at Home Depot, sketched the design on a napkin at lunch, and told Danielle I was going to do it. She said, "You've been saying that since Obama's first term." Which is fair. But this time I mean it.

The pit will be brick, roughly four feet by three feet, with a grate system that I'll weld myself — or, more accurately, that Pierre will weld because Pierre is a welder and I am an electrician and there are some things you don't attempt just because you're a Beaumont. It'll have a chimney. It'll have a side shelf for prep. It'll be the pit that Joey would have built if he'd lived in a city instead of on the bayou, where he cooked over a fifty-gallon drum cut in half, which worked perfectly fine but lacked what Danielle calls "aesthetics" and what I call "not being held together by baling wire."

Made a shrimp and corn bisque on Thursday night. Rich, creamy, the color of sunset. The corn was fresh — first of the season from the farmers' market on Main Street — and the shrimp were Gulf shrimp from Tony's, not those sad imported things that taste like the packaging they came in. I roasted the corn first, which is a move I learned from a YouTube video and not from Joey, and I feel a tiny bit guilty about that, like I'm cheating on my heritage with the internet. But the roasted corn adds a sweetness that makes the bisque sing, and I think Joey would have approved, because Joey approved of anything that tasted good, and he didn't care where you learned it as long as you learned it well.

Colette lost her first tooth this week. She put it under her pillow and the Tooth Fairy left two dollars, which Colette said was "not enough for the pain I went through." She's seven, cher. She's going to be a handful. She's going to be magnificent.

That bisque was the whole week in a bowl — Colette losing her tooth and being so thoroughly herself about it, the first real corn of the season, the way Thursday evenings can feel like a small pocket of grace if you let them. I needed something that tasted like home but felt like I was still learning, still moving forward, and that’s exactly what this turned out to be. Here’s how I made it.

Prep Time: 5 min | Cook Time: 10 min | Total Time: 15 min | Servings: 2

Ingredients

500 g raw peeled large shrimp (King Prawns), tails removed
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 teaspoon ground basil
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon fresh cracked black pepper
1/2 - 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper (add more to suit your tastes)
2 teaspoons sweet paprika (or smokey for a different flavour option)
2 bunches of asparagus, halved
1 teaspoon olive oil
4 cups Cos lettuce leaves (or lettuce of choice), washed and ready to use
1 avocado, cubed
1/4 red onion, sliced
1 handful fresh basil leaves
1/3 cup greek yogurt
1 teaspoon lemon pepper
1 teaspoon lemon juice (optional for extra flavour)
2 tablespoons water (or olive oil)
Salt to taste

Instructions

Season and cook the shrimp and asparagus. In a shallow bowl, combine shrimp (prawns) with all of the spice ingredients, and rub into the shrimp until evenly coated. Heat a large pan/skillet on medium heat and add the olive oil. Sauté the shrimp/prawns and the asparagus while turning occasionally until the shrimp/prawns and asparagus have started to change colour and are just cooked (about 5 minutes).
Assemble the salad. Combine the lettuce leaves, avocado, onion slices and basil leaves in a salad bowl. Add the shrimp/prawns and asparagus over the top. Drizzle with the dressing.
Make the dressing. Combine the yogurt in a bowl with the lemon pepper, lemon juice (if using), water and salt. Mix well to combine.

Nutrition (per serving)

Blackened Shrimp, Asparagus and Avocado Salad with Lemon Pepper Yogurt Dressing — When the Season Turns and You Need Something That Tastes Like Moving Forward